Assessing the Environmental Implications of Agricultural Biotechnologies: A Sociological Perspective

Lt. Governor Peeler closed his welcoming speech at this NABC meeting by stressing the importance of family farming to South Carolina, and the fact that much more needs to be done to help save family farms. I agree. Even so, when we discuss research, technology and so on in relation to family farming, there are often clashes among differing groups because competing social values relating to the importance of family farming strike many as being outside of the realm of science or empirical discourse, and difficult to choose between. It is thus ironic, but also instructive, if we recognize that debates over the environmental consequences of agricultural science and technology have been as or more perplexing and just as contested as the matter of the social implications of technology. In this paper I explore some of the reasons why this has been the case, and offer what some appropriate responses from the public agricultural research system should be. The environmental implications of new agrofood biotechnology products arguably represent today the most socially-salient issue relating to agricultural biotechnology — and, for that matter, to agricultural technology in general. This is not to suggest that the structure of agriculture or the socioeconomic impacts of technology have ceased to be of concern to a good many people, or that there are no longer expectations that agricultural research will contribute to increased productivity, competitiveness, food safety, and so on. With the shift of our national political culture — and most of the rest of the world’s — over the past two decades or so, the issue of the socioeconomic consequences of agricultural research and technological change is now on the margins of the political agenda of most governments and agencies. Many of these Assessing the Environmental Implications of Agricultural Biotechnologies: A Sociological Perspective