At a time of significant technological change and digitization in the biological sciences, the COVID19 pandemic has highlighted again the inequities in the research and innovation ecosystem.
Based on a consultation with an internationally diverse group of stakeholders from multiple fields
and professions, and on a broadly representative ...
At a time of significant technological change and digitization in the biological sciences, the COVID19 pandemic has highlighted again the inequities in the research and innovation ecosystem.
Based on a consultation with an internationally diverse group of stakeholders from multiple fields
and professions, and on a broadly representative set of case studies, this report offers a new
approach to the global governance of genetic diversity and genomic research and innovation.
We recommend that in addition to the many valuable efforts at the macro-policy level and at the
micro-level of projects, teams and organizations, the global community concerned with
genetic diversity and genomic research and innovation should devise and implement a
meso-level initiative that includes three main components:
1. First, it should establish a new
professional capacity to govern research
and innovation at the meso-level.
Governance capacity, built through a
networked community of practice, has the
benefit of connecting and integrating macrolevel policy intentions with micro-level
actions. It facilitates a consistent
professional basis from which local and
regional level flexibilities can generate new
norms of reflection that better integrate
multiple synergies, reconcile tensions,
recognize inequities, and redress persistent
inequalities.
2. Second, the global community should
redouble efforts to build research capacity in
genomic research and innovation in the
Global South and for Indigenous Peoples.
Such an effort should be focused on
broader programmatic objectives that
facilitate cross-national and cross-regional
collaboration, as well as enhancing
research communities in the Global South
and in Indigenous communities. Together,
the twin capacities of governance and
research can reduce power differentials
among diverse actors and support crisisbased imperatives for data openness.
3. Third, we recommend that existing global
policy frameworks interface with research
governance and capacity investment. This
meso-level approach should gain the
commitment and support from national and
international policy bodies, embedded within
existing specific issue-areas (health,
agriculture, environment).
A new approach, one that can better respond to global crises though more open, inclusive and
equitable participation in research and innovation, is necessary to resolve the tensions among
openness, innovation and equity that the current discourse on genetic diversity reiterates.
Failure to systematically address the social and technical governance challenges will result in
further fragmentation, inequity and vulnerability for decades to come. Conversely, investing in
the current historical moment of the pandemic to build twin capacities for meso-level
governance and research is poised to prevent and/or reduce the impact of future ecological
crises, while contributing to planetary sustainability and prosperity in the 21st century for current
and future generations.
