Seeding Growth
Research
advances create a rosy future for region's life and plant sciences
cluster.
By Kevin
Kipp
It may be
a conundrum to the technocrats of the European Union, but some
St. Louisans know how to feed more people and consume fewer resources.
And
it's a darn good thing, too, if--as Dr. William H. Danforth, chairman
of the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, avers in a January
St. Louis Post-Dispatch op-ed--the world population is headed
to 8 billion souls by 2025.
After
quoting this and other World Health Organization predictions,
he asked: How are we going to feed two billion--roughly eight
times the United States' population--extra mouths?
Not
to mention that presumably there's life--and more babies--after
2025.
"To
protect agriculture for the long term," Roger Beachy,
Ph.D., president
of the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center says in an interview,
"we need to make it is as clean and sustainable as we can possibly
make it." We need to reduce damage to air, soil, and water from
agricultural chemicals.
Again,
how?
Dr.
Danforth's piece went on to suggest that erosion is an even more
immediate concern for agriculture. Worldwide, the annual loss
of topsoil is equivalent to ALL of it in Missouri. How can we
improve the sustainability of farming practices?
Drs.
Danforth and Beachy suggest a solution. Fellows in research at
the Missouri
Botanical Garden say the solution will work. University professors,
corporate scientists, and others tied to the St. Louis plant science
and agriculture economy agree.
They
believe the answer lies in plant and life sciences--including
research on the effects of molecular and genetic changes in cells--to
discover how to safely produce desirable characteristics in plants:
increased yields, drought tolerance, pest resistance and improved
nutrition.
Consider
the potential:
Wait
a minute, cry Europe's trade delegates and some Green Yanks, too:
You might create an herbaceous Frankenstein or bacterial nightmare.
Beachy
grants that step one on the way to market should be, and is, to
question our new technology.
"Step two,"
he says, "is to accept or reject the new technology based on scientific
evaluation and safety to the environment. And "safe, compared
to what?" he asks, "to what already exists? Or to an unattainable
ideal?
"Our
role is to assess scientific validity related, in this case, to
foods that come from biotechnology," he says. "Scientists do that
best by using scientific principles and sharing their results
with the public."
As
scientists and researchers in the St. Louis region continue to
uncover safe solutions for tough problems facing agriculture and
the environment, they are also uncovering an enormous opportunity.
With purposeful positioning, the reasoning goes, the region can
leap forward as the world center of world-class research and world-beating
technologies in plant and life sciences.
(For an
excellent look at how we've responded to plant and life science
opportunities thus far, see Liese Hutchison's cover story in the
October 1999 issue of St. Louis Commerce.)
To that
end, and to add insight, the RCGA asked Battelle Memorial Institute,
the world's largest non-profit research and development organization,
to help area leaders generate a regional strategic plan.
Walter Plosila,
Battelle's vice president of public technology management, has
started with a SWOT analysis: Strength, Weakness, Opportunity,
Threat. Plosila expects that a working technology partnership
will link universities, private business and government.
Also, he
says, the plan will outline "how to coordinate these and
other crucial elements to support each other: work force,
higher education partnerships, capital formation, technology infrastructure,
research parks, incubators, accelerators, smart buildings and
the business climate, taxes, regulations, image and entrepreneurship."
And the
Battelle plan will identify gaps in the research-to-markets continuum,
benchmarks of best practices, identification of core research
strengths.
Our work
will ensure that the St. Louis region will have a strong plant
and life science base that can respond to the ebbs and flows of
the economy," he notes.
Whatever
Plosila and Battelle might find lacking, they will likely laud
the Nidus Center for Scientific Enterprise. It's an incubator
for companies involved in some facet of life science--whether
plant, animal or medical.
Located
on Monsanto's campus and primarily funded by Monsanto, the 41,000-square-foot
building has the capacity to house 13 to 15 companies, according
to Nidus president and CEO Robert Calcaterra.
The
building--besides being adequately environmentally sound to probably
earn a U.S. Green Council award--has laboratories and offices,
as well as what Calcaterra calls "growth chambers designed especially
for ag and research work."
Less
than a month and a half after opening, the center had its first
tenant. But Calcaterra estimated that "in five or six years, our
companies [in-house and alumni] could be generating a quarter
of a billion dollars in annual revenue."
It's
not just the Nidus companies, Monsanto or the region's other plant
and life science institutions that could be adversely affected
by Europe's Luddite-like hysteria.
Beachy
points out that plant science research funding is a small portion
of life sciences research; he estimated 2 to 5 percent. Furthermore,
this sliver of funding is stretched even farther because "sponsored
research generally includes research AND development of a prototype,"
he says.
"We don't
want the current environment in Europe to impact biotechnology
research in this country," Dr. Beachy says. "If Congress cuts
research funding...we're so underfunded already that any cuts
would be devastating to the future. In contrast, we should respond
with more research and information to help our friends at home
and abroad to accept or reject the technologies on their scientific
merits."
For
its part, Battelle's planning won't address the European Union's
concerns. Plosila says, "Our problem isn't to solve the agricultural
biotech issues of the globe. It's to help the RCGA position St.
Louis to be competitive in plant and life sciences, whatever happens
globally.
Instead,
Plosila asks: "Do the various assets work effectively to create
high-paying jobs in St. Louis?"
Kevin
Kipp runs Bubble Communications, a creative services and community
relations firm in St. Charles.
|
