New Biotechnology Center Unveiled
By Katherine Stanley
Tico Times Staff
kstanley@ticotimes.net

Thanks in part to funding from the European Union, Costa Rica 's agricultural and industrial sectors now have a new resource for the latest in biotechnology: the newly formed National Center for Biotechnological Innovation (CENIBiot).

The center, to be located at the National Center for High Technology (CENAT) in San José, will promote the economic development of these sectors by helping businesses improve their productivity by applying biotechnology such as methods for recycling waste products.

The 14.9 million euro ($18.1 million) project is conceived as a five-year effort. Science and Technology Minister Fernando Gutiérrez said yesterday that he expects its effects to be felt far beyond that time period – and beyond Costa Rica 's borders.

“It's not just the country's project, but the region's. We have a large amount of waste, great potential throughout the whole region,” he said at the press conference following President Abel Pacheco's weekly Cabinet meeting. “We'd like this to be a project that transcends political (administrations).”

As part of an agreement signed Dec. 6, 2005, the European Union will offer $13.25 million for the project, and the rest will be supplied by Costa Rica, with help from the private sector, Gutiérrez said. The National Council of University Rectors (CONARE) and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Investigations will support the project.

A committee including members from these councils, the Foreign Trade Ministry, and business chambers from agricultural, fishing and industrial sectors will oversee the center's work. The center will conduct market studies and reports on new technologies, provide resources for technical training for businesses and create a bioprocessing plant where new waste-processing techniques can be investigated.

According to a statement from the Technology Ministry, 1,000 tons of agroindustrial waste, such as those produced by pineapple and banana farms, will be processed as a result of the project.

Pacheco praised the project.

“Here, investigative genius is being wasted,” he said. “We are burying Costa Rica with wastes… that can be reused.”

CONARE head Rodrigo Arias – not to be confused with the brother of presidential candidate Oscar Arias, of the same name – called the initiative “key to Costa Rica's development” and an opportunity to increase cooperation between the private sector and scientific community.