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Outlook on the Global Agenda 2014

  • About this report
    • Introduction by Klaus Schwab
    • Welcome from Martina Gmür
    • Preface by Drew Gilpin Faust
    • Making the Outlook on the Global Agenda 2014
  • Top 10 trends of 2014
    • Introduction
    • 1. Rising societal tensions in the Middle East and North Africa
    • 2. Widening income disparities
    • 3. Persistent structural unemployment
    • 4. Intensifying cyber threats
    • 5. Inaction on climate change
    • 6. Diminishing confidence in economic policies
    • 7. A lack of values in leadership
    • 8. The expanding middle class in Asia
    • 9. The growing importance of megacities
    • 10. The rapid spread of misinformation online
    • In focus: The trends we need to know more about
  • Regional challenges
    • Donald Kaberuka: The cautious optimist
    • Building for the better: tackling inequality, unemployment and corruption
  • Networked thinking
    • Values
    • Employment
    • Interconnectivity, visualised
    • Interactive council map
  • Future agenda
    • The new space race
    • Mapping the future: The technologies changing our lives
    • The future of biotechnology
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    • The future of surveillance
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  • Download a PDF version of this report
  • Download a calendar of 2014’s most significant events
Outlook on the Global Agenda 2014 Home
  • Report Home
  • About this report
    • Introduction by Klaus Schwab
    • Welcome from Martina Gmür
    • Preface by Drew Gilpin Faust
    • Making the Outlook on the Global Agenda 2014
  • Top 10 trends of 2014
    • Introduction
    • 1. Rising societal tensions in the Middle East and North Africa
    • 2. Widening income disparities
    • 3. Persistent structural unemployment
    • 4. Intensifying cyber threats
    • 5. Inaction on climate change
    • 6. Diminishing confidence in economic policies
    • 7. A lack of values in leadership
    • 8. The expanding middle class in Asia
    • 9. The growing importance of megacities
    • 10. The rapid spread of misinformation online
    • In focus: The trends we need to know more about
  • Regional challenges
    • Donald Kaberuka: The cautious optimist
    • Building for the better: tackling inequality, unemployment and corruption
  • Networked thinking
    • Values
    • Employment
    • Interconnectivity, visualised
    • Interactive council map
  • Future agenda
    • The new space race
    • Mapping the future: The technologies changing our lives
    • The future of biotechnology
    • The future of shale gas
    • The future of democracy
    • The future of surveillance
    • The future of the Arctic
    • The future of multinationals
  • Browse by topic
    • Economics and Growth
    • Education
    • Energy
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Environment
    • Finance
    • Geopolitics
    • Governance
    • Health and Well-being
    • Hyperconnectivity
    • Innovation
    • Infrastructure
    • Risk
    • Sustainability
    • Society
    • Technology
    • Unemployment
    • Youth
  • Download a PDF version of this report
  • Download a calendar of 2014’s most significant events

The future of biotechnology

  • Health and Well-being
  • Innovation
  • Society
  • Technology

 

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A researcher demonstrates the process of cloning in a laboratory in National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan © Reuters

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Author

Sir Leszek Borysiewicz is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, and Member of the Global Agenda Council on the Future of Universities

Author

Sir Leszek Borysiewicz is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, and Member of the Global Agenda Council on the Future of Universities

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Advances in biotechnology could eradicate diseases and address challenges in food and water security

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Advances in biotechnology could eradicate diseases and address challenges in food and water security

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Progress in biotechnology depends on tackling ethical and legal constraints

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Progress in biotechnology depends on tackling ethical and legal constraints

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Scientists must be open to scrutiny and debate in biotechnology, explain benefits and anticipate harm

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Scientists must be open to scrutiny and debate in biotechnology, explain benefits and anticipate harm
What needs to happen for biotechnology to reach its full potential?

I am an optimist – I believe that advances in biotechnology will help eradicate diseases, while advances in plant sciences will make it possible to feed the future global population of 9 billion, as well as solve critical issues of water security. However, to get there we will have to tackle the ethical and legal constraints on these advances; this will be crucial for progress.

The power of genetics, the ability to genetically modify organisms, from bacteria to plants to mammals, is of course a huge issue. Because at the same time that it allows us to create stronger, better and more efficient organisms, it also raises the ethical question of whether man has the right to manipulate life. Moreover, the biggest area of development is currently in the mass databases available to scientists. On the one hand they allow us to profile and link patient data in order to increase our understanding and make new discoveries, but on the other hand, the databases touch on the issue of privacy. 

From the survey

“Creating a new technology is less dependent on the huge resources of large organisations. Biohacking and garbage biotech are increasingly popular using off-the-shelf ingredients.”

Tim Harper
Chief Executive Officer and President, Cientifica

There are already ethical constraints in place, both among the scientific community and among the public. In many cases, research must first be approved by an ethics committee, while scientists are always held to account by their peers. The final decision on ethics should be decided by public debate, but the form that debate takes can vary widely, and in the UK, for example, we’ve seen very different reactions. The issue of genetically modified food was largely met by public hysteria, while the 2008 Embryology Bill (which included regulations on hybrid human-animal embryos for research purposes and sex selection) was a two-year debate that was incredibly well-informed and open.

Individual scientists have to ask themselves what they are doing and what they are hoping to achieve. You cannot control every scientist or every country, but scientists must be open to public scrutiny and they must engage in public debate early on, explaining the potential benefits of their research and anticipating the potential harm. 

From the survey

“Advances in biology and the biomedical sciences increase the need to prevent their exploitation for malicious or hostile uses and to reinforce their beneficent ends. In the short term, new fatal infectious diseases cause concern; in the long term, it will be our ability to manipulate the human genome.”

Jeanne Guillemin
Researcher, Harvard Sussex Program on Chemical and Biological Weapons, University of Sussex

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