www.czu.cz ; www.raupp.info

Nations that do not embrace the new "language" of genetics will end up
backward and poor, warns a renowned economist and author who visited London
yesterday. Juan Enriquez is the author of 'As the Future Catches You', an
influential book which predicts that advances in genomics will soon
transform the world economy, November 2004 by Hank Daniszewski.

"The ability to understand new technology will make a country rise or fall
very quickly," he said in an interview.

Enriquez told leaders of London's business and research community yesterday
that cracking the genetic code has created a new form of language -- an
operating code for life. "We will start modifying almost every business in
this world by the use of life functions."

He said manipulating the genetic code can produce amazing new products such
as a weed that can detect land mines or potatoes that produce a cholera
vaccine.

New genetic engineering such as animal cloning or genetically modified food
has already encountered fierce resistance in some parts of the world.
Enriquez said the new technologies carry risks such as bioterrorism, but
nations that embrace genomics will leap ahead and prosper.

"In some countries it will run into resistance and those countries will get
poorer faster."

He said some forms of cloning such as growing replacement body parts will
revolutionize medicine and eliminate the need for transplant organs and
artificial implants. "You will have 40 more years of life and a better
quality of life."

Enriquez's book is an unusual mixture of bulleted facts, graphs and pictures
designed to make his message less academic and more mainstream. In November
2002, London made a bid to become a major player in the biotech market with
the opening of the Stiller Centre for Biotechnology Commercialization.

Enriquez said London is on the right track but should continue to build on
its strengths in new technology and aggressively pursue the brightest
researchers. "The answer for this place may not be genomics. But you better
have an idea of how you will compete in the knowledge economy," he said.

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