SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY POLICY
April 22, 2008
"It's Not the Price That Causes Hunger"
Op-Ed, International Herald Tribune
By Robert Paarlberg, Research Fellow, Science, Technology and Globalization
"Africa's food crisis grows primarily out of the low productivity, year in and year out, of the 60 percent of all Africans who plant crops and graze animals for a living. The average African smallholder farmer is a woman who has no improved seeds, no nitrogen fertilizers, no irrigation and no veterinary medicine for her animals. Her crop yields are only one third as high as in the developing countries of Asia, and her average income is only $1 a day."
March 2008
Starved for Science: How Biotechnology is Being Kept Out of Africa
Book
By Robert Paarlberg, Research Fellow, Science, Technology and Globalization
Heading upcountry in Africa to visit small farms is absolutely exhilarating given the dramatic beauty of big skies, red soil, and arid vistas, but eventually the two-lane tarmac narrows to rutted dirt, and the journey must continue on foot. The farmers you eventually meet are mostly women, hardworking but visibly poor. They have no improved seeds, no chemical fertilizers, no irrigation, and with their meager crops they earn less than a dollar a day. Many are malnourished.
Nearly two-thirds of Africans are employed in agriculture, yet on a per-capita basis they produce roughly 20 percent less than they did in 1970. Although modern agricultural science was the key to reducing rural poverty in Asia, modern farm science—including biotechnology—has recently been kept out of Africa.
February 29, 2008
"Africa's Organic Farms"
Op-Ed, International Herald Tribune
By Robert Paarlberg, Research Fellow, Science, Technology and Globalization
"In Europe, meanwhile, some official donors and nongovernmental agencies are working to block farm modernization in Africa. Despite Africa's worsening soil nutrient deficits, European donors like to promote costly organic farming techniques as the alternative to chemical fertilizer use. This is not how European farmers escaped poverty....European governments and NGOs also promote regulatory systems that block the use of genetically engineered crops, including crops capable of resisting insects without pesticide sprays. Europe's own science academies have found no new risks to human health or the environment from any of the genetically engineered crops placed on the market so far, but since overfed Europe can do without this technology, underfed Africa is told to do the same."
January 25, 2008
"Science and Technology for Sustainable Well-Being"
Journal Article, Science, issue 5862, volume 319
By John P. Holdren, Director and Faculty Chair, Science, Technology and Public Policy Program
"I would urge every scientist and engineer with an interest in the intersection of S&T with sustainable well-being...to 'tithe' 10% of your professional time and effort to working in these and other ways to increase the benefits of S&T for the human condition and to decrease the liabilities. If so much as a substantial fraction of the world's scientists and engineers resolved to do this much, the acceleration of progress toward sustainable well-being for all of Earth's inhabitants would surprise us all."
AP Photo
December 10, 2007
"Stop Getting Mad, America. Get Smart"
Op-Ed, The Washington Post
By Richard Armitage and Joseph S. Nye, Sultan of Oman Professor of International Relations
"...security threats are no longer simply military threats. China is building two coal-fired power plants each week. U.S. hard power will do little to curb this trend, but U.S.-developed technology can make Chinese coal cleaner, which helps the environment and opens new markets for American industry
In a changing world, the United States should become a smarter power by once again investing in the global good — by providing things that people and governments want but cannot attain without U.S. leadership."
AP Photo
December 6, 2007
"Riding New Technological Waves"
Op-Ed, Business Daily, (Nairobi)
By Calestous Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development; Director, Science, Technology, and Globalization Project
"The real test will be on the extent to which African leaders, entrepreneurs and development agencies can harness the power of emerging educational technologies and modernise the continent’s educational systems....Africa's early entry into content development will help to put the technologies to effective use. A delay will either render the technologies irrelevant or will condemn Africa to dependence on ill-adapted educational material."
2007
"Political Actors on the Landscape"
Journal Article, AgBioForum: The Journal of AgroBiotechnology Management & Economics, Special Issue: Biofortified Food Crops: Progress and Prospects in Developing Countries, issue 3, volume 10
By Robert Paarlberg, Research Fellow, Science, Technology and Globalization and Carl Pray
"Efforts to introduce novel agricultural crops or foods are welcomed and supported by some politically important groups in the developing world, ignored by others, and at times opposed by a significant few. When considering the political actors on the landscape most likely to take active positions either for or against novel foods, there is little or no evidence of political resistance to any of the biofortified foods developed thus far using conventional crop-breeding techniques, yet resistance to GMO crops has been widespread for much of the past decade. Which actors on the landscape are opposing GMOs, how powerful are they, and will their opposition weaken if the current generation of GMO crops carrying improved agronomic traits is followed by a second generation of GMOs carrying improved nutrient traits?"
December 2007, forthcoming
"Who Funds Technology-Based Small Firms? Evidence from Belgium"
Journal Article, Economics of Innovation and New Technology, issue 1, volume 17
By Ant Bozkaya, Research Fellow, The Dubai Initiative/Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program
Who Funds Technology-Based Small Firms? Evidence from Belgium
November 13, 2007
"Putting Biotechnology to Economic Use in Africa"
Op-Ed, Business Daily, (Nairobi)
By Calestous Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development; Director, Science, Technology, and Globalization Project and Ismail Serageldin
African leaders are determined to forge a new economic outlook based on science and innovation. This is reflected in their decision to seek advice from African experts on the role of biotechnology in Africa’s development.
The results of the work of the High-level African Panel on Modern Biotechnology are contained in Freedom to Innovate: Biotechnology in Africa’s Development....Freedom to Innovate outlines specific and practical measures to advance development, quality of life and environmental sustainability using biotechnology. It is a bold statement on the need for Africa to build the capacity needed to manage emerging technologies.
November 13, 2007
"Africa Should Bank on Innovation"
Op-Ed, Business Daily, (Nairobi)
By Calestous Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development; Director, Science, Technology, and Globalization Project and Ismail Serageldin
"Biotechnology offers a wide range of economic growth opportunities for Africa. But as “Freedom to Innovate”, a biotechnology report on Africa’s Development shows, the continent needs to locate biotechnology policy in the context of wider economic strategies. Technological development goes hand in hand with overall economic growth and not as an isolated activity."
