Transgenic Food: Uncertainty, Trust, and Responsibility

TLDR: To build trust and solve the controversy between the intrinsic uncertainty of science and the demand for safety coming from the citizens-consumers, the scientific community together with industry and policymakers should set up an open, self-reflexive, and multidisciplinary process of technology assessment.

Abstract: The adoption of regulations concerning transgenic food is expected to ensure consumers that authorized products have been deemed safe. The majority of scientists agree on the safety of genetically modified organisms (GMOs); however, contradictory reports on health risks associated with GMOs have appeared in the scientific literature, supporting the conclusion that risk assessment is a science of uncertainty that requires more than just scientific knowledge. To build trust and solve the controversy between the intrinsic uncertainty of science and the demand for safety coming from the citizens-consumers, the scientific community together with industry and policymakers should set up an open, self-reflexive, and multidisciplinary process of technology assessment in which scientific knowledge is integrated by societal knowledge proceeding from different social actors. The scientific community, in particular, should also openly acknowledge the existence of uncertainties and risks and ensure that research on GMO safety is not dependent on the positions of large corporations. In a way, institutions deputed to the advancement of scientific knowledge should promote themselves as a new agora and become central meeting points where all can engage in science innovations, learn, and share expertise and experience. The final goal is to enable citizens to acquire the necessary tools for building up the democratic possibility to choose among present and future options enabled by biology innovations and become active actors of the society of knowledge.