A Short History of Talking Biotech : Fifteen years of iterative action research in institutionalising scientists' engagement in public communication

Biotechnologie wordt al geruime tijd beschouwd als een van dé technologieën voor behoud en verbetering van kwaliteit van leven. Nieuwe onderzoeksmethoden hebben echter geleid tot maatschappelijke vraagstukken die de steun voor biotechnologie in Europa hebben doen dalen. De afgelopen jaren hebben biotechnologen gezocht naar een adequaat antwoord op de bezorgdheid en twijfels van het publiek. Hun zoektocht gedurende de periode 1991-2005 is hier in kaart gebracht. De studie analyseert diverse communicatieactiviteiten, leidt criteria af voor wetenschapscommunicatie en beschrijft een model voor het bereiken van een groot publiek, gebaseerd op entertainment, emoties en educatie. Tevens wordt een overzicht gegeven van de (institutionele) beperkingen en benodigde competenties van wetenschappers. De studie toont aan dat biotechnologen vinden dat zij moeten communiceren, maar dat hun gesloten beroepspraktijk een belemmering vormt voor actieve deelname. Naast communicatievaardigheden zijn kennis over de maatschappelijke impact van toepassingen en de aanpak van ethische en maatschappelijke issues noodzakelijk. Belangrijk is ook dat wetenschappers reflecteren op hun eigen waarden en meningen over mogelijke toepassingen van eigen onderzoek, in de rol van burger, consument of patiënt. Zeker één op de vier biotechnologen mist deze competentie. Bij een duurzame introductie van nieuwe technologieën speelt wetenschapscommunicatie een essentiële rol. De universiteit moet hiervoor de verantwoording nemen, zoals zij dat ook doet voor onderzoek en onderwijs. Dit vereist aanpassingen op institutioneel niveau, o.a. toevoeging van training aan curricula, afstemming met de algemene doelstellingen van de universiteit en opname in (financiële) allocatie- of sturingssystemen. Zo worden wetenschappers beloond en niet gestraft voor hun inzet in wetenschapscommunicatie.Cock Buning, J.T. de [Promotor

The History of Makassan Trepang Fishing and Trade

The Malayan term trepang describes a variety of edible holothurians commonly known as sea cucumbers. Although found in temperate and tropical marine waters all over the world, the centre of species diversity and abundance are the shallow coastal waters of Island Southeast Asia. For at least 300 years, trepang has been a highly priced commodity in the Chinese market. Originally, its fishing and trade was a specialized business, centred on the town of Makassar in South Sulawesi (Indonesia). The rise of trepang fishing in the 17th century added valuable export merchandize to the rich shallow seas surrounding the islands of Southeast Asia. This enabled local communities to become part of large trading networks and greatly supported their economic development. In this article, we follow Makassan trepang fishing and trading from its beginning until the industrialization of the fishery and worldwide depletion of sea cucumbers in the 20th century. Thereby, we identify a number of characteristics which trepang fishing shares with the exploitation of other marine resources, including (1) a strong influence of international markets, (2) the role of patron-client relationships which heavily influence the resource selection, and (3) the roving-bandit-syndrome, where fishermen exploit local stocks of valuable resources until they are depleted, and then move to another area. We suggest that understanding the similarities and differences between historical and recent exploitation of marine resources is an important step towards effective management solutions

The role of bioenergy in a climate-changing world

Bioenergy has been under intense scrutiny over the last ten years with significant research efforts in many countries taking place to define and measure sustainable practices. We describe here the main challenges and policy issues and provide policy recommendations for scaling up sustainable bioenergy approaches globally. The 2016 Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs defined under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change) (UNFCCC) Conference of the Parties (COP21) will not reach global Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emission targets of 2°C. Sustainable biomass production can make a significant contribution. Substantive evidence exists that many bioenergy cropping systems can bring multiple benefits and off-set environmental problems associated with fossil fuels usage as well as intensive food production and urbanization. We provide evidence that there are many approaches to land use for bioenergy expansion that do not lead to competition for food or other needs. We should focus on how to manage these approaches on a synergistic basis and how to reduce tradeoffs at landscape scales. Priorities include successful synergies between bioenergy and food security (integrated resource management designed to improve both food security and access to bioenergy), investments in technology, rural extension, and innovations that build capacity and infrastructure, promotion of stable prices to incentivize local production and use of double cropping and flex crops (plants grown for both food and non-food markets) that provide food and energy as well as other services. The sustainable production of biomass requires appropriate policies to secure long-term support to improve crop productivity and also to ensure environmental as well as economic and social benefits of bioenergy cropping systems. Continuous support for cropping, infrastructure, agricultural management and related policies is needed to foster positive synergies between food crops and bioenergy production. In comparison to fossil fuels, biofuels have many positive environmental benefits. Potential negative effects caused by land-use change and agriculture intensification can be mitigated by agroecological zoning, best management practices, the use of eco-hydrology and biodiversity-friendly concepts at field, watershed and landscape scales. Global climate and environmental changes related to the use of fossil fuels and inequitable development make it unethical not to pursue more equitable energy development that includes bioenergy. To achieve sustainable development, competitiveness and costs of bioenergy production need to be addressed in a manner that considers not only economic gains but also development of local knowledge and social and environmental benefits

Scholierenplan wordt ontwikkelingsproject

BT/Biotechnology and Societ

Consumer choice: Linking consumer intentions to actual purchase of GM labeled food products

With a mandatory labeling scheme for GM food in Europe since 2004 measuring actual consumer choice in practice has become possible. Anticipating Europeans negative attitude toward GM food, the labeling was enforced to allow consumers to make an informed choice. We studied consumers actual purchase behavior of GM food products and compared this with their attitude and behavioral intention for buying GM food. We found that despite a majority of consumers voicing a negative attitude toward GM food over 50% of our European respondents stated that they did not actively avoid the purchase of GM food and 6% actually purchased one of the few available GM labeled food products in the period between September 2006 and October 2007. Our results imply that a voiced negative attitude of consumers in responses to questionnaires about their intentions is not a reliable guide for what they actually do in supermarkets. We conclude that the assumption of a negative attitude with regard to GM food is at least in part construed.BT/BiotechnologyApplied Science

Unravelling emotional viewpoints on a bio-based economy using Q methodology

A transition to a bio-based economy will affect society and requires collective action from a broad range of stakeholders. This includes the public, who are largely unaware of this transition. For meaningful public engagement people's emotional viewpoints play an important role. However, what the public's emotions about the transition are and how they can be taken into account is underexposed in public engagement literature and practice. This article aims to unravel the public's emotional views of the bio-based economy as a starting point for public engagement. Using Q methodology with visual representations of a bio-based economy we found four emotional viewpoints: (1) compassionate environmentalist, (2) principled optimist, (3) hopeful motorist and (4) cynical environmentalist. These provide insight into the distinct and shared ways through which members of the public connect with the transition. Implications for public engagement are discussed.The politics and administration of institutional chang