Ulrich W. Suter, as Vice-President Research and Business Relations what are your thoughts on the matter at this juncture?

Ulrich W. Suter: I hope that all concerned parties have entered their objections. The Federal Supreme Court did not, after all, censure ETH but with the permission procedure. The interested parties and people involved were not formally invited to enter objections to our request . The procedure should now be completed in an exemplary manner.

“Opponents” of the field experiments accuse ETH of obstinacy. Why is this experiment so important?

For one thing, it has to do with the freedom and responsibility of research. Green technology is controversial and a lot of people fear unforeseen risks. The public naturally expects conclusiveanswers from the universities on the worthiness and dangers of green technology. Such answers, however, can only be found via responsibly conducted research, and in order to carry this out, scientists need freedom of research. Freedom, for example, to carry out strictly controlled, supervised field experiments. Freedom in research is not an end in itself; for a university it is a vital prerequisite without which it cannot fulfil its obligations and responsibilities.

A second, very important prerequisite for scientific work is that researchers need to know what conditions their work must meet for permission to be granted. To use a sports analogy: rules must be clear and cannot be changed during play, as they were during the wheat experiment. We want a clear answer from the authorities concerning rules under which research on GM crops is possible in Switzerland.

Freedom" in research – is it unlimited?

No, of course not! There must be clear limits that research does not breach. And these limits must be set by the legislator and the authorities, together with the procedure which researchers must follow to obtain permission to conduct experiments. This procedure must be based on clear and binding rules.

Could not ETH save money if it conducted its outdoor trials in the USA – in the country of unlimited freedom?

There are two reasons that oppose this kind of outsourcing. Firstly, it would be far more difficult to take full control of the experiment. And precisely with this kind of experiment, that is extremely important – the trial in Lindau would be the safest in the world! I also find it unethical to export experiments that cannot be carried out in Switzerland to a far away country. One cannot use two yardsticks!

Chronologie eines Experiments

Chronology of an experiment October 1999: Christof Sautter submits a first proposal, which is rejected by Buwal for formal reasons 15th November 2000: Proposal submitted by the ETH Institute of Plant Sciences 20th November 2001: Negative decision from Buwal 31st December 2001: ETH Zurich submits an administrative complaint to UVEK 13th September 2002: UVEK sustains the complaint 20th December 2002: Buwal accepts proposal Beginning of March 2003: Third parties appeal the acceptance of the proposal, Buwal refuses postponement 3th March 2003: Federal Court of Justice rules on the complaint of refusal of postponement, case goes back to Buwal 2nd April 2003: ETH Zurich submits the abrogation of permission by Buwal together with new announcement for proposals to include third parties from the start of the process 26th June 2003: New submission of the proposal, brought up to date but otherwise unchanged 22nd July 2003: Publication in the Federal Notification Paper 15th September 2003: Closing date for registering objections

"We continue to seek dialogue with critics," stresses Ulrich W. Suter, Vice-President Research (picture: Peter Würmli) large

Why do you think the issue of so-called green genetic research is so hotly debated?

Everything that has to do with nourishment is emotionally loaded. We all feel touched by it and the wish for healthy and tasty food is present in everyone. At the same time the necessity for genetically modified crops is not clear to everyone. The cultivation of GM crops is increasing all over the world, as is the pressure to introduce them in even more places. Even if Switzerland were to remain a gene technology-free zone, we cannot hide our heads in the sand and say, "we don't want this technology so we aren't going to allow our scientists to carry out GM research". We would run the risk that, in a few years, Switzerland would not even have the competence to assess developments in green technology, let alone deal with them.

How can the scientific community build up the public's trust in its research plans? The public can see for itself that in nature the outcomes are not always predictable, for example, as when rainbow trout imported from America destroyed the native brook trout.

The scientific community must listen to these critical voices in society at large. This means that researchers must openly inform the public and seek the debate with its critics. In the case of our field experiment with wheat we tried to do this from the very beginning. We always made clear that our research plans were not tied to later implementation plans, but intended to address questions of a fundamental nature. And we took up the critics' arguments and strengthened existing security measures.

We will continue discussions with critics. In the end, we are all seeking a solution to the same problem: how is Switzerland to deal with the issue of research of genetically modified plants? To forbid field experiments or forcefully hinder them is simply not an answer worthy of a responsible environmental organisation. We would therefore like to use the case of field experiments with wheat to resolve the question in the interest of all parties concerned.

Shouldn't ETH come to terms with these fears and step up research, for example, in the area of biosafety?

Precisely the field experiments we are talking about highlight an important biosafety component. One aspect of them is to compare the advantages and disadvantages of chemical versus biological plant protection and weigh them against one another.

A final suggestion: could a solution be found to overcome the fears by granting participation, for example by including NGOs, such as Greenpeace, in a research fund for biosafety and by giving them some say in the themes and projects that are researched?

I find that an excellent idea. A private foundation could be set up, for example, where all important "stakeholders" are represented on the board.