Biotechnology in development

The past few decades have seen an impassioned scientific and social debate on the pro and cons of biotechnology. This book questions the primacy of this pro/anti debate and points out the possibility of going beyond it to a 'third way': tailor-made biotechnology.
The book describes the emergence of new power relations within global food chains. However, power is not only seen as a system of dominance, but also as a force driving the development of change strategies. Therefore, technologies are not seen as a fate (to be accepted or rejected), but as a challenge to political creativity.

The book also contains a DVD with four documentaries in which concrete efforts of civil society organizations are filmed to re-invent biotechnology. In different contexts such as farmers' fields schools in India, urban agriculture in Cuba, participatory plant-breeding in Ecuador and food networks in Ghana, it is shown how biotechnology is re-made from a social perspective.

This pro-poor and empowering biotechnology may be an alternative for the exploiting and industrial biotechnology of multinational corporations.