Dr Gulbanu Kaptan People’s acceptance of food biotechnology in the UK and Switzerland

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hello everybody i'm steve banwart i'm the director  of the global food and environment institute   at the university of leeds you can gather from my  accent i'm from the usa i have an undergraduate   degree and a master's degree in environmental  engineering from the university of iowa   i did a phd in natural environmental sciences at  the swiss federal institute of technology i work   on soil and water resources particularly related  to agriculture and my core science is chemistry   it's a great pleasure to welcome you to the fifth  virtual seminar of the global food and environment   institute the title of today's talk is people's  acceptance of food biotechnology in the uk and   switzerland gene editing versus gene modification  which will be presented by dr gilbano captain   the global food and environment institute is an  interdisciplinary research community which brings   together members from across academia industry and  public policy to work on the integrated challenges   of food security and environmental change for  further information please visit the global   food and environment website our seminar is a part  of a series of seminars so please check the chat   function with the link to our series advertised on  the eventbrite website and can look at our twitter   feed for more information before i introduce  today's speaker i would like to remind you of the   seminar etiquette please ensure that your cameras  and microphones are switched off for the duration   of the seminar the presentation will take  about 20 minutes during which please use the   chat function addressed to everyone with your  questions at the end of the presentation there   will be a 10 minute q a session during which i  will collate questions from the chat function   and i'd like to remind you that the seminar  is being recorded and a recording will be made   available on the institute's youtube channel so  now i would like to introduce dr gulbano captain   uh captain uh dr captain is an associate professor  in behavioral decision making at the center for   decision research at leeds university business  school gulbano's research focuses on judgment   and decision making in the areas of innovative  food technologies food safety food waste and   healthy eating she is particularly interested in  research projects that require interdisciplinary   collaboration between social and natural  sciences she has been involved in a number of   uk and internationally funded projects including  those supported by esrc bb-src the german research   foundation and the eu framework 7 program  welcome gobano and i'll pass the floor to you   thank you very much steve thank you hello everyone  it's a pleasure uh to give a talk in this seminar   series uh my talk today will be on an experimental  study that i conducted we talked to colleagues   from switzerland dr angela berg from eta hazuri  and dr sabrina kessler from university of zurich   uh i think angela is in the audience today hi  angela and she's a great colleague to work with   really and the motivation uh for this research  was our interest in people's perceptions and   acceptance of knowledge technologies there were  quite a lot of research on genetic modification and those studies mostly did not show real  public support for genetic modification   however there is much less research on gene  editing because it's a new technology newer   technology than genetic modification and it's more  advanced and our uh there weren't much papers but   there were indications that people may perceive  gene editing differently than genetic modification   therefore uh we decided uh to conduct a study   uh to understand and compare the acceptance  of the two applications um but before i start   talking about our study i would like to give  some background information and briefly explain   the differences between genetic modification and  gene editing so as we are all on the same page this is the figure i found quite clear to  understand uh in the past so i would like to share   this one with you today sorry if this is a  very simple figure for some of you and you   if you are already aware of this but as i  said i want uh everyone to be on the same   page when i present our study uh that's why  i wanted to talk a bit about uh this figure   uh but i now noticed that i didn't put the  source so i will edit to the slides later   so if you when you see the presentation  later you will have the source as well   the first picture is about a genetic modification  so to create genetically modified crops   here there's a plant example scientists remove  uh the preferred gene from one organism it   could be anything it shouldn't be a crop it  could it could be an animal yeast whatever   they remove this gene from one  organism which is shown in red here and   randomly introduce it to another organism here  the plants avano genetically modified uh type   of crop is bt corn for example as an example  where a bacterial gene that produces insecticidal   toxins was introduced into the part of the  plant so they remove a bacterial gene that   is producing some toxins for the insects to the  plant so as as soon as the insect eats the plant it is intoxicated the insect is toxicated so the  plant is preserved in the case of gene editing   uh business small control tv to  a living organism's existing dna   rather than the introduction introduction  of a new foreign gene and in g   in gene editing it is nearly impossible to detect  weather an organism's dna has been edited or not   because the changes are indistinguishable from  naturally occurring mutations so if you do gene   editing then it is nearly impossible to detect  and it is one of the concerns some but this is   one of the concerns in editing the advantage of  gene editing over traditional reading methods is   that the changes it makes are more targeted and  efficient it's quite rapid so we expect similar   changes or we can have similar changes with  traditional breeding methods but we need to   wait more and these are more random however with  gene editing they are more targeted and efficient now i would like to give a background  about genetic modification and gene editing   related research and policy is  an introduction to our study after talking about our understanding  of genetic modification and gene editing   producing safe and high quality foods while  simultaneously handing consumer aversion towards   small technologies are among the challenges the  food industry faces today so they need to produce   safe and high quality food but at the time  at the same time there is consumer aversion   about mobile technology so it's a challenge for  the food industry food biotechnology applications   particularly gene technologies are under a  significant amount of secret finance skepticism   on other hand there are limited existing data  suggesting that editing of genes to be under less   public security genetic modification so  the results in terms of gene editing seems   more promising or encouraging compared to genetic  modification the existing eu legislation requires   that all gene edited organisms are classified  as gmos irrespective of whether they could be   produced by traditional breeding methods as i  explained in the previous slide and this was   confirmed by a court of justice of the european  union in 2018 so it was confirmed there was a   big debate about it in 2018 but it was confirmed  so gene editing organisms are classified as gmos   as a result the uk was also before brexit the  uk was following the eu legislation about gmos   until the end of the transition period uh  although switzerland is not an eu country um   they are following the eu legislation as  well however the uk and switzerland are   faced with the decision whether to change the  regulation regarding gene editing applications   for these decisions it is vital uh it's vital  uh to take the public's views of food pipe   food well technology associated risks and benefits  so if as a government you need you would like to   change the policy they would like to change the  regulation of course they need to consult to the public as a result therefore recently  conducted a public consultation   about recreation of uh genetic technologies  with a particular focus on gene editing   as it means to tackle uh tackle  agricultural challenges in the uk   it was closed a week ago on the 17th of march and  therefore will provide a response in three months   so according to the consultation document the  link is on the slide if you may want to see according to the consultation document of  tefra gene editing is a technology that   would benefit the uk in terms of providing  abundant and healthy foods which reduce   environmental impact this is the main point  they make in the consultation document   and in addition the view is that organisms  produced by gene editing should not be regulated   as gmo genetic modified organisms if they could  have been produced by traditional breeding methods as a result of the consultation defra may  seek to amount existing definition of a gmo   as it applies to england's only this would  mean that germ legislation would no longer   apply to organisms produced by gene edited  gene editing and other genetic technologies but this will be done if this could have been  produced by traditional breeding techniques   so uh gene editing will not be regulated as  germans if they could have been produced by   traditional breeding methods so it doesn't  apply to inserting foreign genes etc my talk is focused a bit on uk of course because  i'm presenting the study here now in leeds   so and there's a debate now it's a hot topic in  the uk so the focus of the topic is mostly the uk so this study was conducted about a year  before the public consultation started   however even at that time there were some coverage  in the media indicating that uk government would   approach to gene editing differently than  the eu and we conducted a study in the uk   and switzerland to investigate people's acceptance  of food biotechnology with a particular focus on   genetic modification versus gene editing  and i was preparing to slice yesterday i   chose these pictures um very nice  pictures from the uk and switzerland   i think we all miss holidays and traveling 3d so  sorry about that if you see them a bit irrelevant but they made me cheer up a bit last night um in our study we recruited participants  through a market research company uh they   applied quota sampling based on gender age and  education uh we had 490 participants from the uk   and 505 from switzerland and the samples were  comparable in terms of age gender and education uh we designed an online 15-minute  survey consisting of three parts   these were people's associate associations  and affect towards food biotechnology an   experimental part on people's acceptance  of genetic modification versus gene editing   applications and individual variables such  as trust and risk aversion in the first part   participants were asked to provide uh maximum  ontario associations when i say association   uh i'm from turkey originally i think it's  not so easy for me to pronounce association   when i say association i mean words images  thoughts that came to mind uh so we asked   them to provide maximum three of them uh that  came to their minds when they heard the term   football technology and then they were  asked how they feel about those associations next they were provided a very short  text explaining photo biotechnology i   have it in the next slide and i am not  going to read it and i am not going to   ask you to read it uh i i just would like  to emphasize that so we ask them uh their   words images or thoughts that came to their  minds first uh it was an open-ended question   danny asked about their feelings about  us and then we provided this text   and um but i would like to emphasize this here  the focus is on more environment environments uh environmental benefits of food biotechnology and  gm and ge were given as examples of biotechnology   and these are all in line with the text  we provided in the experimental section   and following this text partisan story again asked  about their feelings about full tech biotechnology   first they uh provided their feelings about  their associations then they did the same after   reading our text which is very much in line with  the text we provided in the experimental part the experimental part measured how technology  scientific uncertainty and media format affected   participant acceptance of genetic modification  and gene editing it may be better explain   uh this part on the actual texts provided here um   so for the experimental part participants from  each country were randomly split into four groups they were first presented uh a text on  genetically modified tomato with extended   shelf life it was the benefit followed by a text  on gene edited tomato with extended shelf life   for example there were four groups a group one  got a text on their screen is in the picture on   your left um it was like an online newspaper  they read an online they were asked to they   were asked to imagine an online newspaper  so they read it as an online newspaper   and there is information about  genetically modified tomato on it and   the uh uncertainty here was uh higher  uncertainty i think high certainty uh yeah scientific scientist concludes with  high certainty so this text or the conclusions   were given with high certainty it is what we  communicate to them group four for example got   a text on their screen is in the picture on your  right online food blog written by sarah brown   uh and it takes explaining first genetic  modification then gene editing with a phrase about   scientific uncertainty like scientists conclude uh  with high uncertainty this time so four groups in   each group uh in the first group there was high  certainty online newspaper format in the second   group lost certainty online newspaper format in  the third group there is high certainty all nine   foot block and in the fourth group there is high  certainty high uncertainty and online football   uh i hope it's clear uh it's not easy to  explain it in one slide okay and then we uh   measured acceptance with three items after  presenting each text i mean the gm text the   text on gm and uh ge text gene editing text uh  i think i need to just skip this slide so these   are the questions we asked about acceptance  because otherwise i can't finish on time i would like to talk about the results  regarding participants associations and   effect about food biotechnology uh 15 categories  were identified through content analysis the most   prevalent of these were uh science and research  specific food eating and nutrition as we   remember they provided associations and they  provided many associations of course and   the content analysis was conducted so uh the most  uh prevalent uh ones were science science research   a specific food eating and nutrition genes and  genetic modification the affected ratings of   these most prevalent associations were positive  for science and research and for specific food   eating and nutrition however genes and genetic  modification was associated with negative effect the overall effect reported for the mentioned  associations was near the midpoint of the scale   as you see um and this that this did not differ  significantly between the two countries however   after reading the introductory text uk  participants reported more positive effect than   service participants so the text  affected how they feel about gene editing regarding uh people's acceptance of genetically  modified versus gene edited tomato uh the   experimental effects uh on people's perceptions  were assessed with a mixed model anova with three   independent variables technology uncertainty and  media the dependent variable was active sense regarding acceptance technology  exhibited the largest effect size   participants from both countries exhibited  slightly higher levels of acceptance for the   gene edited food than for genetically  modified food and the findings of the   experiments suggest that people's acceptance  of genetically modified versus genetic food is   rather stable and cannot be easily changed by  information provision after reading the text to investigate participants acceptance  of genetically modified versus gene   edited food further we conducted  two linear regression analysis   almost the same variables very important for the  acceptance of two two technologies except for   gender country and trust and i  will explain this in the next slide this is just to let you know about the results  overall uh i think it will be better with this   slide the significant uh the significant variables  for the acceptance of the two technologies were   desirability affect about food biotechnology  risk aversion and level of uncertainty   that means the more desirable is longer shelf  life of a tomato the higher is the acceptance   the acceptance of both genetically  modified anginated tomatoes was   higher if participants initially expressed  more positive effects towards biotechnology   acceptance of genetically modified and gene  edited food was lower if participants expressed   high risk aversion and if participants were in  the high uncertainty condition if scientists   were uncertain about the results gender country  and trust in institutions were only relevant   uh for the acceptance of genetically modified food  for these variables acceptance of uh genetically   modified food was higher if participants were male  from the uk and had higher trust in institutions   i will skip this one as well so i just thought  that you may find the statistical descriptive   statistics about trust interesting so i would like  to just cover uh the discussion and implications   as yeah i don't have time left i think so overall  this study shed some light on sinister and uk   residents perceptions of uh food biotechnology  and their acceptance of genetic modification   and gene editing applications according to our  results uk residents are more supportive of uh   food biotechnology than people in switzerland and  this is in line with previous findings for example   showing that participants from the uk exhibited  much higher support for gmos dances participants a large number of participants in our study  couldn't provide a single association when   we asked them they provided many different  associations suggesting a multi-dimensional   conceptualization of food biotechnology so it's  possible that large interpersonal differences   exist in people's understanding of biotechnology  including poor genetic modification and gene   editing and this suggests further research  about people and people's understandings of   biotechnology based on how multidimensional  it is and our our results revealed that   having tomatoes with longer shaft life is  the most important predictor of uk assist   participants acceptance of gene-edited  tomatoes this suggests that the importance   of perceiving personal benefits on  the acceptance of gene edited foods   again prior research suggested that offering clear  and tangible benefits positively impacts consumer   acceptance of food innovations and technology so  communicating benefits is really important and i'd like to thank you for listening  hope i could give you a bit of flavor of   public perceived genetics editing particularly  in the uk i wish we had more time uh to talk   after conducting this study we decided  to conduct a more comprehensive study   on gene editing only and we conducted interviews  with experts about their views on gene editing   applications in the food domain and we will  be conducting interviews with consumers   soon so i should have more helpful results to  share in three months time maybe so i will be   happy to answer uh your questions and or hear  your comments if you have any many thanks thank you gobano that was fantastic we have  questions and please could participants   uh please upload any further questions to  the chat line and we'll uh we'll keep going   if if colleagues need to leave that's uh  because of their schedule that's fine too   i'll try to have a go for about 10 minutes  or or so maximum for question and answer   if we if the discussion keeps going um i had  one first question was one from me when you were   discussing this perhaps the potential this defra  work of redefining for regulatory purposes what   is a gene edited organism have any countries are  you aware of any countries that have already done   such a redefinition and if so where and what  what implications are are possibly being observed   yeah as you can imagine in the u.s so they  have a different definition japan australia   argentina these are the ones i remember but as  developed countries the united states japan and   australia already have a different definitions  of or this sort of definition of gene editing   and they don't apply uh the same regulation to  gene edited foods as they apply to gmo okay and   you know in those countries is that information  in any case um made available to the consumer at   the point of purchase or is that just for more  food production purposes and and um i think i   don't know exactly i should say but uh without  informing the public particularly in a developed   country without informing the public no regulation  should be made so i assume they communicated this okay there's another question which  is assuming gene editing is defined   in the form of traditional breeding methods  how different is gene editing organisms than   from biofortification which is defined as breeding  using conventional methods do you have a view on   that okay so i i'm a social scientist of course  i i don't know the technical issues much i can't   just explain my view but i'm sorry if uh it's not  as expected but uh in traditional reading methods   what i understand i i had an interview with  experts so i i learned from them mainly with   biologists and molecular biologists it's how they  explain to me it's how i understood in traditional   reading techniques uh i think whatever you  do is slower and more random however uh   with gene editing it is much quicker  and targeted because you use crisper uh   mostly and so it's quite an advanced  technique so you know that to put   the gene or value will edit the  sequence and so it's not random   and the process happens very quickly compared  to traditional uh methods but i am not so sure   whether my answer is satisfying because  i don't know much about fortification okay good um there was a follow-up question to  that is how sure are you from the survey results   the participants fully understood the difference  between gene editing and genetic modification well   that is why we are conducting a new study  now as i said it was just to have a flavor   uh we started with the experimental study and  then uh decided to have a more comprehensive   study starting with interviews with experts and  consumers so of course there are limitations   uh in the study but there are indications and  the findings are in line with the literature   findings although there aren't many literature  findings so in that sense it is it encourages us um if any participants have further  questions please upload them i   i have one question final we're through  the questions that were on the chat line   uh golbano i would just be very  interested to get your personal just sort of some speculation about how this is  potentially positioning the uk should this type   of change and definition be approved be accepted  in the uk what is how does this potentially change   our you know trade position on what we might  purchase from the usa australia or what we   might export elsewhere is there a sense you  have a sense of how this can influence um   you know food supply business in the uk and and  retail well from what i read so far and from   what i know so far uh and based on the study we  studies we conducted uh uk government is willing   to is inclined to change the regulation uh and  defining gene editing different than gmo and   the reasoning is when you read the public  consultation report of the defra is   because of environmental benefits and sub having a  better food supply because when you applied apply   gene editing then you'll have crops that you  can grow in any season for example the ones i   can't think of now you can do many things so it  matches uh the scenario we have for the future   where we don't have food for everyone uh there  isn't much availability abundance of food so   with regards to that it will contribute gene  editing applications contribute to this and that's   why defra started a public consultation uh so they  think that it would be beneficial for the country   and for the citizens however before deciding it  of course there needs to be a public consultation   and we don't know what's gonna happen in three  months in three month time on the other hand   uh from uh previous research there are findings  that uh for example there's a group of people who   think that it could be genetic modification and  origin editing it doesn't matter but it is sort   of playing gods or inserting new things to plants  or animals so this can't be accepted and resource   shows that it is nearly impossible to change those  attitudes however there are other research showing   that because of financial reasons uh which i don't  expect because i think it shouldn't be the reason   to accept gene editing uh if you don't have uh if  the reason is just getting cheap food it shouldn't   be tourism it should be more than that however  other research is showing that people are more uh   tolerant now about novel food technologies and  there's an advancement uh and my conclusion is uh   technology is advancing and um we know what's  gonna happen in the future we don't have a very   rosy scenario for the future so as there  will be some technological advancement and   this this could be followed but i think here the  main question is whether some companies will be   advantaged from that or not and it is one of  made the main question of the ngos rather than   risks and benefits because it seems that gene  editing doesn't have much risks from what i know   however the main question is uh who  will produce those which companies   will would it be a set of the big companies then  what what are the farms going to do i think these   are the questions that need to be asked and  these questions are being asked by the ngos now okay great we'll stop our seminar there thank you  very much for that and thank you for giving that   uh more extensive answer at the end about some of  the outlook for this i hope it would be great to   have you back for a seminar in a year or so to  show us uh what what else you have learned on   this as it goes forward this is a fascinating area  and of course it's extremely relevant um right now   so thank you very much galbano and thank  you everyone for participating today and   attending and uh direct colleagues  to the youtube channel later on for   uh colleagues that were unable to join today thank  you very much goodbye thank you very much bye

2021-03-28

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