are the technologies themselves. The vehicles used to commercialise
biotechnologies have also been different in developing countries, raising
even more questions as to the ability of many of these countries to narrow
technology gaps and fulfil their development goals.

Finally, the book attempts to understand the complex and important
relationship between biotechnology and the world's biological resources.
The issue of the rapid erosion of the world's environment and biological
resources became popularized during the 1970s and 1980s. Concerns were
raised in various fora about the rate of destruction of forest cover and the
extinction of wildlife as a result of the destruction of their habitats. People
concerned about the erosion of the world's biological diversity have often
pointed the finger at industry, especially the pharmaceutical industry, and
now most recently the whole grouping of industries which have successfully
harnessed biodiversity. In sharp contrast, biotechnologists generally do not
agree with this version of the story. They argue that their use of biological
resources has proved to be beneficial for all human beings and that their use
of biological material has not been a contributing factor to the large-scale
depletion that we are witnessing at present. The work that has been done
until now largely reflects this division. Most discussions of biotechnology
examine its development in isolation of this debate as do discussions of
biodiversity depletion and conservation. In presenting this debate, this book
attempts to examine the development of biotechnology within the context of
this debate for the simple reason that unless one can understand the
technology within the larger debate, it is going to be much harder to
understand the necessity of and how to conserve the world's biodiversity
while easing access to it by biotechnologists.

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