Acceptance of Crop Biotechnology Requires a Change in Communication Strategy

Ever since the first transgenic plant emerged from a green clump of callus, grant proposals were erected upon grand ideas, visions of crop genetic engineering innovations positively impacting people and the planet. But how many of these actually came to fruition? More than three decades of journal articles articulate the discoveries of gene-trait connections and how they may be implemented to improve profits for farmers, products for consumers, environmental stewardship, and the plight of the food insecure. The shelves and autoclaves of academic, government and industry laboratories speak stories of innovation unrealized. Today’s latest gene editing technologies stand to speed innovation with greater precision with less perception of risk-- but will the next wave of crop solutions created via transgenesis or site-directed nucleases also fail to reach the field? Their deployment is not limited by safety or utility. Instead, they are hindered by a lack of social license to implement technology, driven by understandable concerns, many not based in reality, and some stoked by well-constructed disinformation campaigns. The solution is public engagement, yet scientists engage at low frequency, and fail to connect in effective ways when they do engage. The goal of this article is to illuminate the agricultural biotechnology communication chasm, how it happened, its effects, and implementable solutions. Scientists need to understand the how information flows, the social guardrails that impede information flow, and ways to bypass psychological barriers to deliver trusted information. Rapid deployment of next generation plant biology solutions is dependent on scientists retooling their communication strategies, and then becoming part of the social conversation.