Regulatory & Science Diplomacy Perspectives of Plant-Based Gene Editing

Muhammad Adeel

doi:10.60867/00000111

Rising challenges to food security, combined with mitigating risks constitute a significant threat to global agricultural productivity. Advances in plant-based geneediting technologies including Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) have the promise for delivering agricultural innovation, but they have also raised governance challenges stemming from the fragmented regulatory architecture and divergent national positions. This interdisciplinary study examines the regulatory and governance landscape, while in a pioneering effort, explores the science diplomacy interface related to agricultural biotechnology. A state-of-the-art systematic review of regulatory jurisdictions across the world maps the existing trend towards exemption of (Site- Directed Nuclease) SDN-1 based gene-editing, while demonstrating that the regulatory architecture continues to be disharmonised, impacting international trade of biotechnology crops. These regulatory asymmetries, serving as a “non-tariff trade barrier”, emphasize the need for interdisciplinary engagement between policy, regulatory and knowledge stakeholders to encourage evidence-based regulations and moving towards alignment. To further explore the practical dimension, how the regulatory preferences, post- CRISPR, are socially and politically constructed, a qualitative analysis of stakeholder submissions to the Office of the Gene Technology Regulatory (OGTR) Technical Review of the Gene Technology Regulations (2019), through the socio-technical imaginaries framework is carried out. The findings illustrate competing scenarios – ranging from proinnovation to precautionary principle driven – shaping the Australian interpretation of scientific evidence, risk considerations and bio-futures. The existing imaginaries not only influence domestic agricultural biotechnology regulatory trajectory but also shape negotiating forums at multilateral forums. The study, while expanding on the science diplomacy approaches, initiated a pioneering negotiation simulation, “the Biotech Game”, which role-played the future of plant-based gene-editing regulation under the Cartagena Protocol of the Convention of Biodiversity. The various iterations of the simulations involving a diverse interdisciplinary cohort of approximately 250 participants, explored the science-policy interface in international negotiations, while serving as an educational tool. Qualitative survey data show a significant increase in participants’ understanding of policy and regulatory complexity, while also demonstrating the challenges in achieving consensus for decision-making. Coalescing insights across regulatory frameworks, global policy landscapes, and imaginaries, the study recommends integrating science diplomacy at all levels of the process (treaties and regulations), products (trade alignment), and education (negotiation simulation) to support evidence-based and interdisciplinary governance pathways for gene-edited crops.

Regulatory & Science Diplomacy Perspectives of Plant-Based Gene Editing

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