BIO Deutschland’s Fourth Parliamentary Evening

At the beginning of May, BIO Deutschland held a political information evening in Berlin on the topics of biotechnology and genetic engineering. Around thirty guests from the Bundestag (Lower Chamber in the German Federal Parliament), ministries, science, and industry from the biotech sector attended the event. The aim was to discuss how the innovation capacity of small and medium-sized companies can be improved during the worldwide economic and financial crisis.

Following an introduction to the subject matter by Peter Heinrich (Chairman of the Board of BIO Deutschland), approaches to the optimisation of knowledge transfer were outlined in short presentations (Horst Domdey, BioM Biotech Cluster Development GmbH.) Helmut Schühsler gave a presentation about the need for a friendly investment climate in order to ensure innovations. Ferdinand Pavel from DIW econ GmbH introduced methodological approaches on how future-oriented sectors could receive better support. Finally, Inge Broer from the University of Rostock gave a talk on current R&D projects in plant biotechnology that are of great commercial interest but will most likely not have a viable future as a result of current legislation in Germany.

Members of the Bundestag and representatives of the Ministry of Science and Research and the Ministry of Economics and Technology had the chance to obtain information on other current issues in German biotechnology from representatives of the board of BIO Deutschland and chairpersons of the association’s working groups during the dinner, which was held at the German Parliamentary Society after the presentations.