WASHINGTON -- The controversy surrounding the use of genetic engineering in food has diverted attention from what will ultimately be the most important impact of biotechnology on agriculture. According to Barbara Wheat, Chairman of consulting company The Bowditch Group, Inc., the most significant uses of biotech in the future will lie in areas unrelated to food and pharmaceuticals.

"Although biotech's initial appearance has been in pharmaceuticals and in agriculture," Wheat said in an address at the BioTherapeutics '99 conference, "In the future the really transformative uses of biotech will go far beyond these areas, and even far beyond what we currently think of as `life science.'" Areas where biotech will have industry-changing impact, according to Wheat, include chemicals, materials, and even information technology. "Just as computers have revolutionized the way we live and work in the 20th century," Wheat said, "Biotechnology will transform our lives in the 21st century, transform them in ways we can't even imagine now."

"Biotechnology in agriculture is not going to be about food," Wheat stated. "It's going to be about using renewable, nonpolluting resources to produce innovative products that will be as much a part of our lives as plastics and computers are now."

"As with any radically new, transformative technology, the ultimate uses of biotech can't be foreseen now, at the beginning," said Wheat. But leading companies, such as DuPont, Dow Chemical, and Monsanto, are already establishing a presence in industrial biotechnology, both through internal programs and through partnerships with small biotech specialty companies. The founding, within the last two years, of a plethora of non-pharmaceutical biotech startups is only the first stage in the emergence of this technology.

The BioTherapeutics '99 conference, co-sponsored by The Bowditch Group, takes place in Washington DC during the week of October 12. For more information on the conference.

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