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EU Says Biotech Sector At Risk Over Funds

Posted on: Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 06:00 CST

EU Says Biotech Sector At Risk Over Funds

source: Associated Press Tech News

The future of Europe's biotechnology sector is at risk unless European Union governments devote more resources and effort in overcoming regulatory hurdles and public fears, the EU's head office said in a report Wednesday.

In its first progress report since adopting a strategy to promote life sciences and biotechnology last year, the European Commission said diverging policies across the 15-nation EU could "seriously hamper" efforts to promote the industry as a source of jobs and growth.

A recent commission survey of private biotech companies found that 61 percent had canceled research projects on genetically modified organisms, also known as GMOs, over the last four years. The number of notifications for GMO field trials dropped 76 percent between 1998 and 2001.

"Now that legitimate consumer and environmental concerns have been tackled by strict EU legislation, it is time to reverse this downward trend," said EU research commissioner Philippe Busquin. "If we do not react, we will be dependent on technology developed elsewhere in the world within the next 10 years."

Commissioner Erkki Liikanen, responsible for high-tech industries, said the collapse in investor confidence has left many small biotech enterprises unable to get funding to take commercial advantage of research findings. He called for concerted public and private action to improve the investment climate.

One major roadblock cited by the report was the failure of nine of the 15 EU countries to transpose EU legislation on biotechnology patents into national law, more than two years after the deadline. The commission could decide this month to refer the countries - Germany, Austria, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden - to the European Court of Justice.

Opposition to the legislation concerns the patentability of biological material, including human genes. But the commission argues the package contains precise safeguards for the "dignity and integrity of the person," thus preventing anyone from patenting processes for cloning human beings or modifying their genetic identity, for example.

The commission said last year that it expects the global biotechnology market, not counting agriculture, could amount to more than $2 trillion by 2010.

Yet while Europe has more dedicated biotechnology companies (1,570) than the United States (1,273), those in Europe are relatively small, newer and undercapitalized. The U.S. biotechnology industry employs 162,000 people, compared to 61,000 in Europe, and has far more products in the pipeline, according to EU figures.

EU officials expect the 5-year-old moratorium on authorizing new biotech products to end as early as this autumn - if concurrent legislation requiring traceability and labeling of such products clears the European Parliament.

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