BI Numero 39

Biology International
N° 39 (July, 2000)
Editorial by Talal Younès 1
Biological Education: Challenges of the 21st Century
• The Address of UNESCO

by Koïchiro Matsuura, Director General 3
• Biological Education: Challenges of the 21st Century
by Talal Younès 8
• Integrative Biology as a Framework for Education and Training
by Marvalee H. Wake 14
• Biology, Education and Ethics
by André Giordan 19
• Biosciences and Bioeducation in Administrative Decision-Making
by J-C Mounolou and F. Fridlansky 22
• Ecology Teaching in India and in Developing Countries
by P.S. Ramakrishnan 33
• Endangered Resources: Biodiversity and Cultural Knowledge.
by Promila Kapoor-Vijay and Stephen Blackmore 45
• Changing Trends in Biology Education: An International Perspective
By Faquir C. Vohra 49
IUBS Members Congresses

● International Association of Sexual Plant Reproduction Research
(IASPRR) Conference, Banff , Alberta, Canada, April 1-5, 2000 56
Publications Reviews 57
Calendar of Meetings 59
Editorial
BIOED 2000
A Milestone for IUBS and UNESCO Collaboration in
Biological Education
Closing session of "BioEd 2000." From left to right: Dr. Faquir Vohra, Prof. Jean-Claude Mounolou, Prof.
Michel Thellier, Prof. Patrick Blandin, Dr. Armoogum Parsuramen, Dr. Talal Younès, Prof. André Giordan
The International Symposium "BioEd 2000: The Challenges of Biological Education

for the 21st Century" was held on 15-18 May, 2000, in Paris, France. This meeting was
organised by two international organisations: IUBS and UNESCO, in collaboration
with two national institutions: the 'Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle' (MNHN),
France, and the 'Laboratoire de Didactique et Epistémologie des Sciences' (LDES) of
the University of Geneva, Switzerland. Eighty-eight presentations were made,
including reviews and research papers organized in three plenary sessions, twenty-six
parallel sessions, four workshops and a poster session.
The reviews papers focused on new biological knowledge in such domains as

biodiversity, ecology, genetics and molecular biology, and their impact on the lives of
human societies in developed and developing countries. Research reports emphasized
new education concepts, approaches and theories, as well as the new educational tools
and technologies and the increasing role in biological education of such new partners
as museums, botanical and zoological gardens, the media, and a large number of
foundations and non-governmental organisations. Special workshops and sessions
were also organized on bioethics, biotechnology, health and integrative biology
education, and such societal issues as citizenship, sex education, sustainability, and
environmental education...
In view of the magnitude and diversity of attendance, the high level of presentations
and discussions, and the specific nature of the meeting place, BioEd 2000 was a great
success. More than two hundred participants from Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe,
North America and Latin America attended the meeting. Sessions took place in such
Biology International N° 39 (July, 2000)
relevant settings as classrooms, laboratories or exhibition halls. And between the

sessions, participants walked and talked among the fish, birds, mammals and butterflies
of ‘La Grande Galerie de l’Evolution’ or along the flowering allées of the ‘Jardin des
Plantes.’ In addition to the MNHN itself, educational material by UNESCO and the
Lake Biwa Museum, Japan, were on exhibit, bringing in more experiences. To top them
off, two theatre performances were offered: “Health fairy tales in preschool education,”
and “Shakespeare Gallery ou la pensée en formes,” while the “Youth Forum on the
Environment,” organized on the day following the Symposium, provided a hands-on
experience for out-of-school biological education!
In advance of the publication of the proceedings volume and the electronic format
(www.iubs.org), we would like to provide highlights of this important event in the
present issue of Biology International:
The address of Professor Koïchiro Matsuura, Director General of UNESCO, outlines

the vision and policy of the principal United Nations’ organisation with responsibility
for both science and education. After reiterating the commitment of UNESCO to the
Declaration of the World Conference on Science, 1999, in Budapest, proclaiming that
the “... access to scientific knowledge is part of the right to education and the right to
information belonging to all people; ... science education is essential for human
development and for creating endogenous scientific capacity, ...” and stating that
biology is at the core of new “contract” between science and society, the Director
General says that he looks forward to strengthening cooperation with the IUBS,
especially in “… keeping this forum open and alive; producing guidelines for the
development of education in such domains as biodiversity, biotechnology, natural
resources conservation and management and bioethics; and assisting UNESCO
Member States in the development of curricula, teacher training programmes,
educational materials.”
In the following paper, “Biological Education: Challenges of the 21st Century,” I present
the rationale and the objectives underlying the organization of BioEd 2000. On a more
specific note, Professor Marvalee Wake explains how Integrative Biology can serve as a
framework for education and training; Professors Mounolou and Giordan both address
the relationships between biological education, ethics, and administrative decision-
making processes, and Professors Ramakrishnan, Vijay and Blackmore review ecology
teaching in developing countries, emphasizing the key role of traditional ecological
knowledge in biodiversity conservation and management. Finally, Dr. Vohra reviews
the major international programmes undertaken since the 1960’s, describing the
changing trends in biology education, from teaching separate scientific disciplines to
interdisciplinary learning, and from isolated societal problems to a more integrated
knowledge society.
Talal Younès
Executive Director, IUBS
2
The Address of UNESCO

by Koïchiro Matsuura
Director General
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
Delivered on his behalf at the Closing Session of the Symposium BioEd 2000:
The Challenge of the Next Century.
Monsieur le Président de BioEd 2000,

Monsieur le Président et Monsieur le Directeur exécutif de l'Union internationale des
sciences biologiques,
Monsieur le Directeur du Muséum national d'histoire naturelle, Mesdames et Messieurs
les participants,
Mesdames et Messieurs,
Je voudrais en tout premier lieu féliciter l'Union internationale des sciences biologiques
d'avoir si bien préparé ce colloque international et proposé un programme
remarquablement complet. L'UISB, partenaire de longue date de l'UNESCO, a réussi à
réunir des experts de haut niveau représentant un large éventail de domaines connexes
pour conduire le débat sur des questions dont l'importance est capitale pour le monde
du 21ème siècle. L'UNESCO a eu l'honneur de parrainer BioEd 2000.
Les débats se sont déroulés dans un cadre exceptionnel, celui de la Grande galerie de
l'évolution du Muséum national d'histoire naturelle que je remercie d'avoir accueilli
cette manifestation.
I can assure you that UNESCO, in full partnership with the IUBS, will be active in
following up recommendations made at this meeting for the improvement of biology
education in its Member States.
As you undoubtedly know, at the World Education Forum in Dakar last month the
international community renewed its commitment to basic education for all.
Governments, intergovernmental organisations, NGOs and all other stakeholders
reaffirmed the high priority that must be given to the provision of quality learning to all
the world's children.
UNESCO is fully aware of its great responsibilities in playing an effective role in

translating this commitment into a concrete reality. We are already preparing to give a
new impulsion to our work in the field of education... And this effort to build up a
world-wide momentum will be the business not only of UNESCO's Education Sector
and Education Institutes, but of all its Sectors, not least of which will be the Science
Sector.
3
For, in my view, basic education in the emerging knowledge society of the 2lst century
must be seen as part of a continuum that includes secondary, technical and higher
education.
Why is this so important?
We live in a world where information has become the primary resource. There is a
general consensus today that education is the key to development. But we are only
beginning to realise just how essential it is for each and every country to have its own
science and technology base. And the first step to building up this base is in the
provision of science and technology education programmes.
Without this, countries cannot be active participants in the knowledge society. Without
a basic science and technology education, people cannot participate fully in our fast-
moving, interconnected and globalized world. We see every day the power of shared
knowledge. But to share knowledge means sharing as active partners, not as passive
recipients.
This is why science education was an important topic at the World Conference on
Science in Budapest last June, organised jointly by UNESCO and ICSU, the
International Council of Science, of which the IUBS is an active member.
The Declaration on Science and the Use of Scientific Knowledge, adopted in Budapest
declared:
“... access to scientific knowledge is part of the right to education and the right to
information belonging to all people; ... science education is essential for human
development and for creating endogenous scientific capacity, ...”
As part of its follow-up to that Conference, UNESCO's Education and Natural Science
Sectors are working together to prepare an integrated International Plan of Action for
Science and Technology Education. Its main thrust will be to renew, diversify and
expand science and technology education at all levels of learning, both in-school and
out-of-school.
The promotion of biology teaching through science and technology education for girls
and women and the development of gender sensitive approaches will be given a high
priority.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Biology is at the core of new “contract” between science and society to which the
Budapest Conference sought to pave the way.
To summarise, the new contract involves renewed public support for science education
and research on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the commitment of the scientific
community to place science at the service of sustainable development and pressing
human needs in such fields as health and nutrition.
4
Applications of biology today impact - or have the potential to impact - in the most far-
reaching ways on our lives and environment. It is clear that the notion of a social
contract for science, particularly its ethical dimension, has important implications for
the framework within which biology is taught. And of course, the actual scientific
developments which have given applied biology new life-changing powers have
important implications for updating the biology curriculum.
So there is a major challenge for renewing the teaching of biology itself and another
great challenge for teaching the issues linked to biology.
I said in my opening remarks that the biology-related issues you have been discussing
are of pivotal importance to the modern world. It appears to me from the themes of this
symposium's sessions over the past four days that you have been establishing a new
social contract for science education!
You have balanced admirably the scientific aspects, and the social and ethical aspects of
biology teaching. It makes me optimistic for the future of this highly influential
discipline, which has extraordinary potential not only for producing scientists but also
for producing generations of responsible citizens who match scientific, social and
ethical awareness.
This is essential, as so many issues of major importance today - concerning human

health, reproduction, food safety, intellectual property rights and so forth - require not
only good analytical skills but a sound grounding in the science itself. In short: the level
of biology literacy needed to be able to participate fully in many areas of public debate
has risen dramatically in recent years.
As you know, UNESCO is actively engaged in encouraging broad debate on bioethical

issues. The extensive world-wide discussions led by UNESCO's International Bioethics
Committee, prior to the adoption by the United Nations of the Universal Declaration on
the Human Genome and Human Rights, offer a model of participatory debate leading to
collective decision-making.
UNESCO has also been at the forefront of international efforts to ensure that the DNA
sequence data generated by human genome research remains within the public domain.
It is essential that such undertakings have strong public support, and that can only come
from a clear understanding of the issues at stake. Here, biology education has a major
role to play. Over half a century ago, UNESCO's founders called in its Constitution for -
I quote - “ ... the education of humanity for justice and liberty and peace..” They wrote
that at a time when molecular biology and biotechnology were as yet unknown, when
issues such as biodiversity and bioethics had not emerged.
The Western world was shaking off the legacy of eugenics, but as yet knew nothing of
the new pitfalls of genetic determinism or the commodification of nature. However, that
insistence that education must be far more than technical instruction remains as valid as
5
ever. And the framework given by UNESCO's founders, when they insisted on the
intellectual and moral solidarity of humankind, remains as valid as ever.
You have been very true to that framework in your efforts to establish ways of
improving not only the contents of, but also access to, biology education. The biology
teaching of the new century must aim at much more than scientific and technical
competence. It must, at its basic level, offer everyone the opportunity of a learning
experience that contributes to personal autonomy and responsible citizenship.
And for up-to-date, relevant biology education to be available to all, it must be given a
new momentum - not only nationally but internationally. Renovated educational
programmes, teacher-training, educational materials and delivery systems all need
special attention.
Let me take the example of biodiversity education. A far greater effort in education in
biological diversity is needed to create world-wide public awareness of the issues at
stake. Only an educated, global constituency for biodiversity can build up the pressure
to ensure that we take the path to a sustainable future. A new global initiative is being
developed by UNESCO with other partners. The mandate for this initiative is provided
by a decision of the last Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological
Diversity, the CBD. It invited UNESCO “to consider launching a global initiative of
biological diversity education, training and public awareness.” This UNESCO/CBD
global initiative will not become a totally new programme of action. Rather, it proposes
to link and support on-going processes and to develop a new dynamic in this way.
Developing this global initiative requires a committed team effort. In addition to the
strong partnership between UNESCO and the CBD Secretariat, close cooperation will
be needed with institutions of the UN family and non-governmental organisations as
well as with teachers and schools world-wide.
UNESCO has convened a first meeting of key partner agencies at its headquarters here
in Paris in July to set the initiative in motion. That gathering will pay particular attention
to the results of this Symposium and will welcome any concrete suggestions you wish
to make on action to be undertaken.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
BioEd 2000 has discussed new knowledge, new issues, new tools and new partners. It
has examined the whole panorama of the biology revolution in order to better
understand and define our approach to biology education. UNESCO is looking forward
to strengthening cooperation with the IUBS in:
· keeping this forum open and alive, and developing and expanding biology
education,
6
· producing guidelines for the development of education in such domains as

biodiversity, biotechnology, natural resources conservation and
management and bioethics;
· assisting Member States in the development of curricula, teacher training

programmes, educational materials and
· working in close collaboration and partnership with the science education

community, notably in the domain of biology education.
In conclusion, I would like to say something about the timing of this Symposium.
I believe the time is ripe for biology education to take centre stage.
It responds to the curiosity of children and young people about so many aspects of life
and the world about them.
It offers them essential tools for tackling the issues which so may young people take to
heart, such as protection of the environment and conservation of plant and animal life.
Public concern about issues like genetic engineering and the ethics of biomedical
techniques suggests that there will be increasing demand for life-long access to biology
education.
I am convinced that biology education in the 21st century will be central to efforts to
reach social consensus on the use of many new technologies and on the management of
natural resources. You have showed that you are prepared to respond to this challenge,
and I congratulate you.
7
Biological Education:
Challenges of the 21st Century
by Talal Younès
Executive Director, IUBS. E-mail: talal.younes@wanadoo.fr
Introduction
Generally speaking, education represents the domain through which humankind

proceeds to transmit, consolidate and develop into human culture, the ensemble of
knowledge systems, science, arts, values and religions.
In a report entitled "Learning - the Treasure Within," presented in 1996 to UNESCO,

Jacques Delors, former President of the European Commission, and his colleagues
recommended that education must be given top priority on the agenda of nations.
Priority to the role of education in providing citizens with a 'passport to life' with which
they learn to be, learn to know, learn to do and learn to live together. Educational
activities now represent a major occupation of human societies. In-school education is a
full-time occupation of a large part of the world's population (more than one billion
students and 20 million teachers, in 1992), and occupies, on average, one quarter of
every individual's life. Increasingly some form of out-of-school education is pursued
throughout life. From an economic point of view, the world expenditure on formal
education in 1996 totaled approximately 1,200 Billion US$ (an average 5,1% of the
world GNP). This budget represents the largest investment in the national accounts of
many countries, yet it is still considered insufficient to cover actual needs.
During the 1990's, with their eyes fixed on the approaching year 2000, a large number
of governments, national and international organizations and groups engaged in a trendy
exercise. They participated at large scale conferences with the express aim to assess past
achievements and failures, reap the lessons gained throughout the 20th century and
identify the key challenges facing humankind at the beginning of the new Millennium.
The first such event was the Earth Summit on Environment and Development held in
1992 in Rio-de-Janeiro, followed by the World Population Conference in 1994 in Cairo,
the World Conference on Higher Education in 1998 in Paris, and the World Conference
on Science in 1999, in Budapest, Hungary.
From these fora, there emerged a world consensus on the role of education, science and
technology as the prime movers and most decisive factors of development. International
programs and plans of action were launched: the Agenda 21, Education 2000+,
Taxonomic Agenda 2000, Species 2000, and the Programs 'International Geosphere and
Biosphere Program (IGBP), and the International Human Dimension of Global Change
(IHDP), etc.
8
The recent history of human societies shows how scientific and technological progress
have helped trigger economic, social and cultural development. In the 19th century,
advances in physics, chemistry and engineering conduced to the industrial revolution.
And in the 20th century, advances in agricultural sciences, physiology, genetics and
breeding of plants and animals provided the basis for the agricultural (green) revolution;
new knowledge in microbiology, immunology, medical and pharmacological sciences
helped reduce the toll of diseases, and resulted in an increased life expectancy.
The discovery of the DNA structure and function ignited a biological revolution which
will continue and expand during the 21st century. Deciphering the genetic code
(alphabet) represents an essential step in the human endeavor to read the book of life,
unravel the complexity of biological systems (molecules, cells, organisms and
ecosystems), and perceive the unity of life through the diversity of living forms.
Progress in the biological sciences is not only bringing about an understanding of the
evolutionary processes and pathways which led to the present world, but also giving the
humankind the power to modify drastically the course of biological evolution, including
his own.
Like other scientific disciplines, biological sciences form a part of the overall human
culture, which represents a specific evolutionary trait of Homo sapiens and marks the
border line with other primate species. However, whereas biological traits are
transmitted between generations through reproduction and modified through mutation
processes, cultural traits (values and knowledge) are inherited and modified (scientific
and technical innovations) through education, i.e., the ensemble of learning, training and
research processes.
In all these processes, biological education, education about life, education through life
and education for life, occupies the center stage.
New biological knowledge
During the second half of the 20th Century, impressive achievements and
breakthroughs have been made in the fundamental and applied knowledge of the living
world , with far reaching implications impacting almost every aspect of human life and
society.
At the micro-level, the development and use of sophisticated molecular biology

techniques have lead to a revolution and the emergence of new disciplines, such as
Molecular Biology, Molecular Genetics, Molecular Evolution and Genomics.
Tremendous progress and breakthroughs have been achieved in our understanding of
animal and plant reproduction and development, and more generally, our understanding
of evolutionary processes. At the macro-level, the development of new concepts, new
approaches and techniques, and the use of modeling, remote sensing and informatics
are bringing about a revolution in the ecological sciences and the emergence of sub-
ecological disciplines such as Functional Ecology, Landscape Ecology, Global
(Biosphere) Ecology and Ecological Networks.
9
The biological sciences have seen the emergence of important interdisciplinary

scientific domains, such as biodiversity, bio-complexity and integrative biology.
New Problematique
A new perception and formulation of the world problematique emerged at the Earth-
Summit of 1992, in Rio-de-Janeiro, Brazil, replacing the traditional and fragmented
vision of the problems facing human societies (individually and collectively). There is
now a better understanding of the relationships and interconnections between the
problems affecting human health, food and environment, problems related to
agriculture and agro-industry, fisheries and aquaculture, pharmaceutical industry and
biotechnologies, the problems of pollution (physical, chemical and biological), as well
as problems related to the conservation and management of biological resources
(deforestation, desertification, soil salinization and loss of biodiversity, etc.)
The new problematique that emerged at the Rio Summit is based upon a trilogy
consisting of biodiversity, global change and sustainable development.
The awareness of biodiversity at the three levels of biological organization: the genetic,
organismic and ecological levels (di Castri & Younès, 1996), highlighted the need to
better understand such issues as the origins, maintenance and change of biodiversity
over space and time scales, the ecosystem function of biodiversity and the many hidden
ecological services it provides to humankind, the need to better conserve and manage
the biodiversity of terrestrial, marine and inland-water systems, providing clues of how
to restore degraded ecosystems. There is also a growing perception for the need to take
into consideration the human dimension of biodiversity and, in particular, cultural
diversity.
The second important issue, the global change and globalization phenomena, has been
considered at the environmental, economic, and information/communication levels.
Pollution problems do not recognize political boundaries between states, and global
warming and ozone holes affect the whole biosphere. To face these problems, it is
necessary to form a global coalition, with all nations working hand-in-hand, if we are to
succeed.
The third and last “mot d'ordre” of the trilogy consists in sustainable development. This
new concept, developed during the Earth Summit, aims at promoting a much needed
solidarity over both space and time scales. On the geographical scale, this means a
solidarity between North and South, between developed and well-off nations and the
developing poor countries of the third world. And, over a time scale, it implies a
solidarity with the future generations, taking into consideration the well-being of the
generations to come, and leaving their options open.
Facing these challenges, research, training and education in science, particularly

biology, are pre-requisites if we are to succeed in bringing about an economically
efficient, socially equitable and environmentally sustainable development.
10
New Educational Concepts and Approaches
The goals, scope and content of biological education vary greatly with its target
populations and the groups and parties involved in its implementation. Biological
education means different things to different people. For biology researchers, education
means the acquisition of the scientific knowledge, data and techniques that are
necessary to perform research projects. For developers, professionals and engineers in a
large variety of domains such as agriculture, health, industry, biotechnology and
environment, education must provide the biological foundations underlying their
respective domains of expertise. And for the general public, the principal aim of
biological education, whether at schools (primary and secondary) or through the media,
must be to develop citizens' biological literacy, i.e., provide them with the core
biological knowledge, the ability to formulate questions, and an idea of how and where
to look for answers, in order to help them to participate responsibly in the life of the
society.
The diversity of the objectives assigned to biological education reflects its social
function which is to re/produce knowledge, apply it and adapt to its impact on society.
Therefore, addressing the challenges of biological education for the next century
requires taking into consideration not only the new problematique and new scientific
knowledge, but also to address the ethical dimension of biological sciences as well as
the new findings of research on education processes and learning theory.
Biology, psychology and cognitive sciences are generating knowledge about how the
human brain learns; and have shown us that we can use this knowledge to intervene
effectively in the learning process of virtually any and all humans. In a comprehensive
study of the theory of learning, Giordan, 1998, explains that learning is better achieved
through a process of deconstruction. Concepts have evolved from the old passive
process, whereby teachers passed or communicated their knowledge to students
considered as empty containers; to the behaviorist and constructivist approach by which
the teachers help the learners to construct knowledge, moving from the simple to the
complex and from the specific to the general; and finally the development of a more
active approach, whereby the re-construction of knowledge follows a necessary phase of
deconstruction, i.e. a process by which the knowledge is generated (appropriated) by the
learners themselves.
The adoption of this new learning concept has important consequences for the
organization and functioning of educational institutions and curricula, the definition and
practice of the respective roles of teachers versus learners, and the relationship between
knowledge acquisition and learners' attitudes, behavior and ability to adapt to complex
and ever-changing environments.
The development of the deconstructivist concept and the reconstructivist approach have
led to more educational institutions adopting a new method of "learning science as
scientists do." Students are invited to participate in research projects designed for them
and the results of which are presented at major scientific congresses and published. At
the AAAS Congress in 1999, held in Anaheim, USA, there were two major poster
11
sessions with hundreds of 'young' scientists (students at secondary schools) presenting

their research results!
Another important consequence of adopting the re-constructivist approach consists in its

great potential to reinforce the societal relevance of biological education, i.e., the link
between science education and the needs of society, which, in turn, calls for the
development of ethical dimensions of science education.
New Tools for Education
Today, the statement “If only biologists knew what biology knows" is more true than
ever. The explosion of scientific knowledge and the rapid production and accumulation
of staggering amounts of scientific data and information are creating the need for
knowledge management, i.e., knowledge about knowledge. Actually, knowledge
management is about learning. It is impossible for educational systems to cover all
domains of knowledge, there is a need for school science curricula to provide citizens
with basic scientific literacy, i.e., a common core of understanding, a knowledge basis
and the intellectual ability to formulate questions and find answers.
At the same time, the explosion of scientific and technological knowledge is introducing
new concepts and tools for distance learning, new access to the world storehouse of
knowledge, and new interpersonal and group communication capabilities. Two
subsequent approaches will also be needed: (1) to develop mechanisms for "learning on
demand" within (2) a framework for continuous, life-long education. The success of
such an endeavor will mark the passage to the education society, to a knowledge
society. Biological training and education will be more and more about knowledge
management than the simple traditional teaching of scientific data. Increasingly,
modern Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is being developed and
used for education in-school and out-of-school situations. In the developed countries,
more and more ICT educational material, CD-ROMs and/or online education tools are
becoming more available for learners. Modeling and simulation games are being
developed. Benefits of introducing ICT are numerous, to mention but a few: increasing
interactivity, availability of immediate links with almost an infinite world library,
encouraging group work, and providing good tools for auto-evaluation.
However the development of ICT in education, and in particular in biological education
still is in its infancy. There is here a large domain for development and research
towards reconsidering the learners and teachers' functions and role and rethinking the
structure of the school, college and university.
New Actors and Partners

Parallel to the explosion of scientific knowledge, the emergence of a new
problematique, and the development of new concepts, approaches and tools, there also
are a host of new parties with huge stakes and interest in biological education. Among
these parties, there are natural partners wishing to strengthen their role in biological
education, such as botanical gardens, national parks and nature reserves, and natural
12
history museums, and science centers. In addition, a large number of organizations,

foundations, and agricultural and industrial corporations (pharmaceutical industries and
biotechnology) are concerned with and, to a certain extent, involved in the development
of biological education programs.
Prospects and Conclusions
Over the next three days of BioEd 2000, a large number of papers will be presented.
The principal aim of the current organization into plenary, parallel or workshop sessions
is provide the conditions for good presentations and discussions.
We hope that whenever possible, the discussions will focus on the main issues and
problems and suggesting and recommending solutions. For BioEd 2000 to be more than
a “happening”, a one-time event, every body’s contribution will be needed to help pave
the way towards the future.
The success in meeting the education challenges will depend upon the dedication,
commitment and efforts of all partners involved (scientists, teachers, students,
politicians, decisions-makers and the public).
I would like to expand the parallel I mentioned earlier between education and biological
reproduction. Because of the pain and high cost of having children and caring for them
over a long period of time, the reproductive success of our species, Homo sapiens,
would have been impossible without this extraordinary invention of life, that is love.
This is also true for education, which is the key to the survival of human culture and
civilization, love is needed for societies to provide for the high cost that education
systems require.
References
Delors, J., (1996). Learning: The Treasure Within, Report to UNESCO of the International
Commission on Education for the Twenty-first Century, UNESCO Publishers, Paris, 266 pages.
Di Castri, F. & Younès, T. (1996) Biodiversity, the emergence of a new scientific field- its
perspectives and constraints, in Biodiversity: Science and Development, Published by CABI,
646 pages.
Giordan, A., (1998). Apprendre. Published (in French) by Belin, Paris, France, 255 pages.
Solbrig, O. & Nicolis, G., (1991). Perspectives on Biological Complexity. IUBS Monograph
Series N° 6, pages 228.
UNEP. 1992. Convention on Biological Diversity, June 1992. United Nations Environment
Programme, Nairobi.
13
Integrative Biology as a Framework for

Education and Training
by Marvalee H. Wake
Department of Integrative Biology and Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of
California, Berkeley, CA 94720-3140. E-mail: mhwake@socrates.berkeley.edu
I introduce the concept of “integrative biology” and education by paraphrasing key

statements in the preamble to the description of the IUBS “Towards an Integrative
Biology” program (Anon., 1999). That is to say, “Integrative Biology” at this point in
its conceptual development means different things to different people. To some, it
emphasizes multidisciplinary (cross-disciplinary, transdisciplinary; including the
incorporation of physics, chemistry, engineering, sociology, economics, etc., as
appropriate) research, especially through the bringing together of scientists with
different, but specific, areas of expertise to address particular questions. To others, it
means using a diversity of techniques and approaches in one’s own research
programme; and to yet others, the emphasis is on hierarchical approaches to questions
and techniques. There are almost as many conceptions of “integrative biology” as there
are people interested in the idea; this results in those people considering themselves to
be “integrative biologists” without any clarification of or agreement upon the central
themes of the concept.
What is “integrative biology?” Traditionally, biologists are trained, and departments

and institutes organized, in a manner characterized by specific approaches, techniques,
working at a specific level of organization in the biological hierarchy, and/or organisms,
investigating on model organisms or on one or a very few species. Integrative biology
is both an approach to and an attitude about the practice of science. It seeks both
diversity and incorporation. It deals with integration across all levels of biological
organization, from molecules to the biosphere, and diversity across taxa, from viruses to
plants and animals. It provides both a philosophy and a mechanism for facilitating
science at the interfaces of “horizontally” arrayed disciplines, in both research and
training. Work at interfaces involves discussion of significant problems among
scientists with diverse expertise and perspectives. It finds appropriate techniques, often
from unanticipated sources, and it makes appropriate, often novel, choices of taxa for
observation and experimentation (so that it is not taxon-bound). It particularly stresses
an approach to problems and questions from diverse perspectives, so that the explication
of the research protocol has the potential to be both innovative and integrative, as
appropriate to the question being addressed. Many of the questions now being
addressed by biologists require both reductionistic and incorporative elements, but in a
framework that allows resolution of the sub-elements of the question to contribute to an
answer to a larger problem. This lays the framework for new models of investigation
and of education.
In the context of a synthetic approach to problems, some investigators have referred to

“integrative” and “integrated” biology, often indistinguishably. In my opinion,
14
“integrative” and “integrated” are very different terms with reference to the concept.
“Integrative” biology refers to the active development of integration through research
and teaching across the hierarchy of biology and of science in general. “Integrative”
biology is an on-going process, flexible and adaptive to the particular complex research
issues being addressed; it emphasizes the training of students to be prepared to have that
flexibility and adaptability, intellectually, philosophically, and technically.
“Integrated” biology would be designed, or pre-designated -- it would have an output or
product, rather than being open-ended and adaptive.
Many biologists are coming to the realization that our ability to deal with questions of
biological complexity would benefit from a more integrative approach that spans the
hierarchy of biological origin, and that includes techniques and theory from several
subdisciplines, not just the biological. In my home department (which is called
Integrative Biology) at the University of California at Berkeley, we are attempting to
design a model for research and education in integrative biology; similarly, the IUBS is
pioneering the presentation of integrative principles and practices in a diversity of
ways.
I present as an exemplar a research- and education-based example of integrative biology

as practiced in my department at Berkeley: the research and teaching of my colleague
Bob Full and his associates, who study locomotion. They examine many animals--
cockroaches, centipedes, crabs, salamanders, and other animals (e.g., Kram et al., 1997;
Martinez et al., 1998; Queathem and Full, 1995). They have found that many animals
(most animals that have limbs) use an alternating tripod gait, and they have analyzed its
mechanical principles (Full and Koditschek, 1999). They have also examined the ways
that gaits change, direction changes, and the differences in intermittent and sustained
locomotion (e. g., Jindrich and Full, 1999; Kubow and Full, 1999). They study the cell,
tissue, whole limb, and organismal bases of locomotion, and develop models that are
testable in terms of principles. Understanding how animals locomote is allowing the
development of muscle equivalents and of “walking” robots. They work on uneven
substrates, including the bottoms of lakes and oceans. The tripod gait that characterizes
most animal locomotion, and the “revelation” that animals don’t move in straight lines
at constant speeds, but must adjust in order to compensate for both external and internal
factors, are principles that are revolutionizing robotics. Further, the adjustment can be
simply a physical property of the appendages of a crab or a robot -- neural feedback is
not required. Little needs to be programmed into these robots. Big and small robots are
being developed that can explore oceans, go into terrestrial areas where humans can’t or
shouldn’t, and miniaturized robots are being developed that can potentially be employed
in blood vessels -- but making them able to move is the key. The key point is that
functional morphology and biomechanics are informing engineering, and engineering
and physics are informing morphology. The instrumentation that functional
morphologists now have available is expanding the scope of the science--much better
cameras, computer-aided analysis, treadmills, running tracks, flumes, wind tunnels, and
others all make innovative new research possible. Many functional morphologists are
becoming highly integrative, as they look at the feedback from the skeleton to the
nervous system, and muscle fiber dynamics, at one level of understanding locomotion,
and the mechanical properties provided by the environment at another; this was
15
illustrated in a recent article in Science written by six of my colleagues who study

animal locomotion from different but collaborative and complementary perspectives
(Dickinson et al., 2000).
New areas of biology are developing as a consequence of the kinds of questions and
problems that require attention. The many manifestations of biocomplexity, from
fundamental science to socioeconomic concerns, require approaches that transcend
standard disciplinary lines in terms of research, funding, training, and dissemination.
The problems now being addressed by many biologists require a diversity and range of
expertise. It can be provided by bringing together experts in several areas, but may be
better provided by biologists who are adaptable, flexible, and trained to address new
questions that span levels of biological organization and extend to “non-biological”
realms.
If, as I assert, integrative biology is more than the aggregation of workers with different
expertise to consider complex problems, and new ways of approaching those problems
are important, serious effort is needed to change the way that biologists, scientists in
general, and even non-scientists, are educated and trained, as clearly delineated in the
TAIB preamble (Anon., 1999). As stated there, the “separateness” of disciplines and
sub-disciplines currently is structured by the identification of separate courses of
instruction at all levels of the educational enterprise, and is reinforced at the university
level by the discrete course offerings of departments of instruction and research. It is
increasingly rare that a “department of biology” offers a full range of courses, from
molecular biology to ecosystem biology, neontology and paleontology, and including
members of all three domains of life, as well as the impact of non-biological domains of
study. In fact, departments of biology are few, and their successors often focus rather
narrowly, but with depth, on a small sub-set of biology. Even when taking courses in
different sub-disciplines is encouraged, the course structure does not encourage an
integration and synthesis of the information found in several such courses. This has
several consequences: young biologists are well trained only in one sub-discipline;
students who will become teachers in primary and secondary schools are not acquainted
with the breadth of biology, let alone how to apply breadth to major questions; students
who will enter other fields of endeavor, and become the educated public, and potentially
policy makers, have only examples of parts of biology before them. Some institutions
are attempting to develop cross-disciplinary programs, but they usually emphasize
breadth of course work; the difficulty in effecting thinking synthetically is that most of
the courses available to such programs are the traditionally structured ones.
How, then, can “integrative biologists” be educated? We are trying a new model in
my department at Berkeley; it is only one possibility, and is imperfect at this time, but
we are trying. We consider ourselves to represent several dimensions of the hierarchy
of organization of biology, and we try to integrate those dimensions in various ways.
We characterize the “old” model of education as the “tunnel” approach; a student learns
a limited scope, but learns it well. The current model of teaching at many places is what
we call the “funnel” approach; students are exposed to a greater range of subdisciplines,
but with emphasis on a specific kind of problem, especially in graduate training (see
Wake, 1998). We now, however, are trying for a mode of education that emphasizes
16
the cross-disciplinarity of both the entry-input and the output in terms of the student’s
facility with a broader scope of information and technique, in an integrative, problem-
oriented framework.
How can this be achieved? We have all the constraints of the status quo that most
institutions do. Curriculum is difficult to change. Clearly, the current course structure
cannot be abandoned; it serves many purposes well. However, the content of such
courses can be expanded to draw on a greater breadth of information, and new courses
can be implemented, probably using information technology, especially Internet
communication and computer simulations, that emphasize integration and synthesis, and
these can be coupled with field work. It cannot be stressed strongly enough that
integrative biology is not just assimilating and synthesizing ever more information, but,
rather, a way of approaching questions and being equipped with the resources to think
broadly about their solutions. Several approaches to developing the curricular and
training structure that would implement integrative biology by adding a greater range of
resources are possible, and immediately:
1) the meeting of scientists with diverse expertise, but an interest in complex

questions, to discuss ways of integrating their approaches (this is occurring
with increasing frequency with the goal of good science, but rarely with the
goal of good education in addition, though this symposium is a notable
exception);
2) the production of teaching materials as well as research publications by such
aggregations of scientists;
3) greater breadth of examples in current courses, and especially a new
emphasis in “traditional” courses of the relationship of course-specific
material to other parts of biology and the current state of the world (this
doesn’t mean a separate, token lecture, but a common thread of
interrelationship throughout the course);
4) the development of technical facilities (image analysis labs, gene sequencing
labs, etc.) that are shared by people working on different kinds of biological
questions, so that exchange of information, ideas, and questions is facilitated
and common principles can be elucidated; and
5) at the level of graduate study, a real emphasis on transdisciplinary training in
both theory and technique.
The process can be initiated by the development of new, non-traditional courses. My

colleague Robert Full, whose research I discussed earlier, is not only a gifted researcher,
but a gifted teacher. He was given an endowed professorship at Berkeley; there is one
stipulation involved in the chair--the holder must design a new university course for
non-biologists that meets the general education requirements in biological science. Full
did this -- he designed a course on animal locomotion that integrates cellular,
organismal, and robotic science. He gives a series of lectures (dynamic presentations
using PowerPoint), and has laboratory/demonstration sections that work with models
and computer simulations. He included one especially interesting aspect. Full wanted a
logically consistent, adaptable course framework and design. Therefore, he structured
his teaching plan so that his model would be applicable at different educational levels.
17
He first tested the model with the school class of his twelve-year-old daughter -- they
loved it, and learned a great deal from it. He then added some slightly more
sophisticated examples and simulations for his University students, but within the same
pedagogic framework. The students loved it, and learned a great deal from it as did the
younger students. This is an ingenious example of integrative biology in evolution that
demonstrates that such an education is indeed possible, and useful.
Developing such courses as first steps would allow the “next generation” to implement
education and training with new ideas and approaches to integration, synthesis, depth
and breadth. It should be our charge and our mission to facilitate those developments in
every way possible--and immediately. At the same time, it is essential that scientists
interested in an integrative approach to research and education should be in extensive
communication, so that a common philosophy of integrative biology guides our efforts,
though their expression should be flexible and as varied as our backgrounds and the
questions that we are investigating permit.
References
Anon. 1999. Towards an Integrative Biology (TAIB) Program. Biology International 39: 1-9.
Dickinson, M. H., C. T. Farley, R. J. Full, M. A. R. Koehl, R. Kram, and S. Lehman. 2000.
How animals move: an integrative view. Science 288: 100-106.
Full, R.J. and Koditschek, D.E. 1999. Templates and anchors: Neuromechanical hypotheses of
legged locomotion on land. J. Exp. Bio. 202: 3325-3332.
Jindrich, D.L. and Full, R.J. 1999. Many-legged maneuverability: dynamics of turning in
hexapods. J. Exp. Bio. 202: 1603-1623.
Kram, R., Wong, B. and Full, R.J. 1997. Three dimensional kinematics and limb kinetic energy
of running cockroaches. J. Exp. Bio. 200: 1919-1929.
Kubow, T. M. and R.J. Full. 1999. The role of the mechanical system in control: A hypothesis
of self-stabilization in hexapedal runners. Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc. London B. 354: 849-861.
Martinez, M. M., Full, R. J., and Koehl, M. A. R. 1998. Underwater punting by an intertidal
crab: A novel gait revealed by the kinematics of pedestrian locomotion in air versus water. J.
Exp. Bio. 201: 2609-2623.
Queathem, L. and Full, R.J. 1995. Variation in jump force production within an instar of the
grasshopper Schistocerca americana. J. Zool. London 235: 605-620.
Wake, M.H. 1998. Integrative biology in biodiversity: an approach to questions, answers, and
training. Pp. 35-40 In Frontiers in Biology: The Challenges of Biodiversity, Biotechnology and
Sustainable Agriculture. C.-H. Chou and K.-T. Shao, eds. Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
18
Biology, Education and Ethics

by André Giordan
Laboratoire de Didactique et Epistémologie des Sciences (LDES), Geneva University,
CH 1227 Geneva, Switzerland. E-mail: giordan@uni2a.unige.ch
Since the 1st conference organized by the IUBS Commission for Biological Education
(CBE) in 1975 in Upsala, Sweden, a lot of things have changed... During this last
quarter century, the research in biology has led to an enormous expansion of our
knowledge. For example, the ability to maintain cultures of totipotent human embryo
cells points towards new directions in fundamental research. There is a great hope that,
one day, we shall be able to use such cells to repair deficient tissues or even to replace
whole organs.
Other potential forms of therapeutic utilisation would involve re-programming of

differentiated somatic nuclei, either by introducing them into nucleus-free oocytes and
to obtain new embryos and stem cells, or else by taking foetal blood cells from the
umbilical cord; etc. Yet such striking scientific achievements also raise important
ethical questions:
- Should we be producing such cells, since they come from human embryos,
particularly as they derive from deliberately aborted foetuses?
- Should human embryos be the object of research at all?
- Do therapeutic ends justify cloning means?
What to do now ?
Questions about living organisms are never neutral, and there can be no single answer.
The debate currently surrounding DNA epitomizes the issues involved. Isn’t it absurd
for biologists to want to patent it? Shouldn’t it be pronounced the common property of
humankind?
This is a hot topic, especially now that a race has escalated between private and public
research institutions! The DNA molecule is the basis for countless techniques, which
specialists call ‘biotechnologies’ or ‘genetic engineering’, but which the public is not
afraid to brand as genetic ‘manipulations’. As long as these are used for therapeutic
purposes or as historical and legal tools, such modifications are well accepted by the
public. In contrast, there are equally virulent opponents and supporters of Genetically
Modified Organisms (GMOs) in the food business. Clearly, a number of technological
blunders (AIDS-contaminated blood supplies, growth hormones, mad cow disease, etc.)
have led the public to question deliberate risk-taking more actively than in the past.
What can be done? Who should decide? Should we let the market function on its own?
Should there be a public referendum, a ‘votation’ like in Switzerland? Should we try
consensus conferences or citizen councils? In all these cases, on what basis of
knowledge should decisions to be taken? Which knowledge is a priority? Biological
19
knowledge has become fundamental to political/social responsibility. Without

biological literacy, individuals are just as illiterate today as they were last century if
they couldn’t read.
Biological education and mediation
Schools do now provide more biological information, especially at the secondary level.
Unfortunately, the absence of genuine reflection has made most biology curricula
completely indigestible. They accumulate anecdotal, non-situated data. Receptors, G-
proteins and kinases are mentioned, without being placed within the context of cell
metabolism. Individual organisms, the knowledge of existing species, the organisation
of life, and even evolution itself have virtually disappeared from the classroom.
At the university, teaching still adheres to historical subdivisions. Cell biology,

biochemistry, immunology, molecular genetics are still taught separately, each
according to its own internal code. Ecology, integrative biology, ethology and
anthropology are given only a limited place. Practical exercises are often problematical,
mere illustrative rituals which do not initiate students into a scientific approach.
Museums, science exhibits and the media are providing a growing platform for
biological issues. However, such presentations frequently make use of outdated cultural
references. Individuals are compared with machines, brains with computers, organisms
with robots obeying microscopic commands, as though each act would be determined
before birth.
Rarely is the possibility of questions taken into account: public worries or the loss of
confidence in science are never discussed. Many people end up being confused and
bored, as hey were previously by physics. The image of Biology was clear; today it has
grown murky.
What biologists do ?
Some biologists - still very few - are “coming out”. They are initiating communications
campaigns to renew the dialogue between science and the citizen. This can lead to even
bigger problems, as the public is increasingly distrustful and wary of new dangers. Such
scientists are aware of their ethical responsibilities but remain clumsy in the way they
fulfil them. Most of them believe that they are contributing to the benefit of mankind, to
the point where they often forget to question their own methods.
BioEd 2000 has been organized to find out what should be done. Should we question
ourselves, and unravel the current links between biology, ethics, education and society,
as directly and critically as possible? The answer is obviously yes, but we must go
beyond this.
The solution is surely not additional classes, more concepts, or more public information
regarding the contents and methods of research. What appears to be key in biological
education is to trigger openness and alertness in the mind of each and every individual,
and to foster curiosity for that which is not obvious, for problems. It is necessary to
20
provide food for thought, to use approaches that link technology, ethics and society, in
order to assess the issues/stakes at hand, and to formulate the ‘right’ questions in need
for expertise.
Out-of-school, we should take advantage of the current controversies surrounding

dioxin, GMOs or mad cow disease, since they trigger a genuine desire for understanding
in the population. They provide learning situations and public education opportunities,
whereby newly available education resources and tools can be used. Given the
difficulties of such a task, we need to construct knowledge networks, linking schools,
the media and internet-like webs.
A clear project
But first, the biological community must itself have clear objectives and projects. And
we must question - as some are already doing – the place that biology has/must have in
society. One can criticise some biological practices, observe how certain biological
approaches are becoming social challenges and consider the way in which the market,
or policies determine research, without necessarily having an anti-scientific attitude. On
the contrary, biologists must engage in such a questioning approach. If not, what would
be the purpose of generating knowledge with no societal relevance?
Definitely, these are not internal questions of biologists to be dealt with behind closed
doors. This is a public debate to be shared as broadly as possible.
21
Biosciences and Bioeducation in

Administrative Decision-Making
by J-C Mounolou and F. Fridlansky
Centre de Génétique Moléculaire, CNRS, 91198 Gif sur Yvette, France
Introduction
Most administrative decision-makers have a confused perception that there is some

kind of conflict between, on the one hand the social and economic goals to which
they are committed and the policies to achieve them, and on the other the recurrent
upsurge of unforeseen, contradictory biological events and social oppositions. In
response, they look to biologists for help and are very often disappointed by the
answers they receive. Similarly, biologists show some defiance, whether overtly or
indirectly, towards decision-makers. They feel that public awareness of current
biological problems is far from what it should be in a well-informed society and that
the intellectual appreciation and social status of biology and biologists are not
commensurate to the role actually played by the living world in economic
development.
The poor reciprocal understanding and loose congruence between society and its
biologists result in delays, costs and difficulties that have an increasingly adverse
effect upon people and could be avoided. With the overall increase of biological
knowledge in the second half of this century, tensions have been rapidly building up.
These trends correlate with growing environmental concerns (pollution, degradation
of ecosystems, loss of biodiversity, water shortages, climatic changes, biological
epidemics...) due to increasd global anthropic impacts, to developments of
biotechnologies (gene therapy, genetically modified organisms), and the privatized
appropriation and mastery of living resources (ecosystems, species and
varieties,etc.) In general, the need for more dialogue and collaboration between
decision-makers and biologists is mutually recognized. Changes are bound to occur,
and the challenge facing societies for the next century is whether they will accord
with the values of humanism, justice and democracy, or oppose them.
The reasons and forces underlying the present unsatisfactory situation are certainly
many and complex. Not least among them, the inconsistent and, in effect, conflicting
teachings imparted to administrative decision-makers and biologists. Administrators
emerge from academic systems that prioritise economics, law, management,
physical engineering... Their formal biological education dates back to primary and
secondary school, and their information on more recent biological advances is
mainly provided by the non-formal circuit (media, associations). Biologists, on the
other hand, receive a thorough biological training, keep pace with the progress of
science and participate in its development. However, for historical reasons, the
social sciences, economics and the humanities have often been excluded from
biology training programmes in the majority of countries. The trend towards
22
specialization has gone so far as to fragment the field of biology into particular areas
(medicine, fundamental biology, pharmacology, agriculture...) and even narrower
specific disciplines (physiology, ecology, genetics,...). In consequence, exceptions
(individual personalities or circumstances of non-formal education) aside, most
biologists do not share the vocabulary and the concerns of administrative decision-
makers and are not fully aware of the true needs and expectations of their fellow
citizens. This situation noticeably increases the difficulty of reciprocal
understanding and reduces communication almost to the point of caricature, with
decision-makers asking for advice and expecting an cut-and-dried answer, and
biologists responding with uncertainties or seemingly narrow or irrelevant
statements. No wonder that such scenarios create frustrations on both sides. Better
education is a high hurdle in the way out of present difficulties. Initiatives could be
devised to enhance the training and competency of both partners: biology education
for administrative decision-makers, and social sciences and citizenship for biologists
would be a first step.
The object of this contribution is to outline what is required now at a very general
level. The idea is not to produce a specific curriculum or syllabus, but to identify
topics of biological literacy that are directly relevant to the administrative decision-
making process. Decision-making processes involving both the economy and the
management of biosystems and bioproducts are generally related to food, health and
industrial products derived from living organisms (wood, textile fibres, medicine,
products of fermentation and biotechnologies,...). The question of how to deal with
environmental problems (pollution, the degradation of ecosystems and landscapes...)
also enters into this complex. Depending on the circumstances, the activities
involved may have very different goals and scales, ranging from the daily survival
of the individual in conditions of poverty to the profit-making strategies of nations
or multinational companies. The decision-making processes and driving forces differ
vastly from one case to the other; yet they all interact ultimately on local, regional,
national and global levels. Everywhere, the language of management gives the same
names to the elements involved in the decision-making process: biological
resources, water and energy supplies, investments, cost of labour and techniques.
A biological education program for decision-makers should first explain that the
concepts and methodologies applied to mineral or human resources cannot simply be
transferred to biosystems, which exhibit their own set of specific properties.
Foremost is the aptitude to reproduce true-to-type, which is not true for minerals,
and at a pace that relates very directly to species. The second property is the capacity
to generate heritable diversity at a low frequency in the course of generations
(mutations). The third property is the potential for adaptation to changing
environmental conditions. The fourth property is the ability to impact on the
environment through biological activities and evolve in response to its changes.
Caught up in constant cyclic and renewal processes at the level of the biosphere,
living organisms are not a stable resource that one can exploit by simple mining.
This presents administrative decision-makers with a very demanding challenge.
Beyond these biological problems lie key questions relating to Mankind’s sense of
23
identity, place in these cycles, and perception of environmental and social

relationships. Examples drawn from the management of biological resources and
risk assessment in the case of GMOs and prions should help to clarify what
biological knowledge may be of relevance for the choices facing society and the
decisions administrators should be making.
Management of Biological Resources
Let us consider the example of an administrator responsible for the management of

biological resources in any country today. His task consists mainly in placing and
optimising his decisions within the constellation of three major driving factors:
government, biology and economy (Figure 1). The government commissions him to
implement a policy, as an expression of the needs (and hopefully the will) of the
people. There is usually little biological information directly needed here (but this
aspect will be dealt with later). Of course, since the managed objects are living
resources, biology constitutes the second point of the triangle, and obviously
biological information is required there (at all the various levels of organisation,
from molecules to ecosystems, with emphasis on physiology, distribution, diversity
and renewal potential of the resources involved). And finally, decisions must be
made with a view toward economic benefit (whether a rapidly returning profit or a
sustainable long-term gain).
GOVERNMENT
Subsidies Open Access/

Taxes Prohibitions
Interest Patents & Quotas

Rates Licences Standards
Property Market Selectivity

for Rights
ECONOMY BIOLOGY
Figure 1: The formal environment of biological management
Thus, the basic terms of the decision-making process will be: property, interest rates,
quotas and standards/norms. In the hands of a civil servant, some tools are more
powerful than others: subsidies and/or taxes, controlled and/or selective access to the
diversity of resources. In private enterprise, the same basic tools are used, but in a
24
different manner : since subsidies, taxes and rules of access are determined outside
the company, they are less directly exploitable by the private decision-maker. On the
other hand, he has more flexibility than the government to decide on investments
and to exchange licences or rights rapidly via the market. In both cases, the
selectivity of choices is the combined result of social, economic and biological
inputs; yet without biology, there is no consistent future in the exercise.
The biology of living organisms (whether useful, such as cereals, or harmful, such as
pathogenic viruses) is essential information. And decision-makers would obviously
do better if they were fully aware of the nature and the dynamic properties of the
objects they manage. This prompts a more thorough examination of the complexity
of the relevant biological knowledge and its organisation (Figure 2).
Biological Knowledge Requirements

• Levels of complexity
• Time and spatial scales
• Environmental mediations
• Biological mediations
• Mediations by/for humans
Organisational Scheme
Social Biological
Dynamics Dynamics
Decision- Selection, Drift

in situ
Making Reproduction
ex situ
Diversity
Figure 2: Management of biological resources
When considering the driving forces of biological dynamics, biologists emphasise

the role selection and drift play on systems, depending upon their reproduction
potential and their biological diversity. Their scientific input into the decision-
making process will depend upon the context of the object of management: whether
it is in the natural environment (in situ : fields, pastures, forests and conservation
25
areas) or in a man-operated artificial ecosystem (ex situ : cells, tissues, germplasm or

DNA banks, collections of museums, arboreta, zoological and botanical repo-
sitories). Clearly, a key element is the balance of determinism and/or stochasticity
in the functioning of the system. In the past, operators were more prone to elaborate
procedures in cases where determinism was a prominent feature. By so doing, one
has the means to optimise decisions and possibilities to evolve with the
circumstances. In a system where stochasticity determines the dynamics, the
techniques and types of decisions will be of a different nature, and concepts of
probability, uncertainty and risk management will feature prominently in finalising
the choices. In brief, an informed decision-maker needs a comprehensive knowledge
of the complexity of biosystems. An Integrative Biology education may provide the
solution, since it takes into consideration complexity levels, space and time scales,
modulations of the system due to environmental factors, to external and internal
biological interactions (impacts of hormones or pathogens for instance), and
deliberate or unconscious human intervention.
The question of human-driven modulations may serve to introduce the second

service which biology provides to decision-making. In Figure 3, the administrative
operation is redescribed to focus attention on the values that legitimate decisions in
terms of social goals in the perception of the operator and thus on the intended uses
of biological resources. Perceptions and values, although not directly involved in the
decision-making process, are the coordinates for the panel of socially acceptable
choices, and in the long run, they evolve progressively, as does society. Under-
standing the importance and dynamics of values and perceptions is also necessary
for the administrator. Access to such a knowledge is essentially provided by the
social sciences. Moreover, developments in psychology (another discipline
emanating from biology) and, however remotely, advances in brain and cognitive
sciences should also be taken into account whenever management activities have to
be implemented and accepted by the public.
Decisions related to biological resources management are obviously not the

prerogative of the regions and people actively involved in the profit-making global
economy of the World Trade Organisation. In many countries, government
administrators deal with populations living in accordance with their traditional
cultures and often struggling with poverty. In this situation, policies related to
biological resources and community survival are closely intermeshed with land uses
and appropriation regimes. In schematic terms, these people developed food
production, indigenous knowledge and specific cultures on three basic activities :
pastoralism, hunting, foraging and forest exploitation (Figure 4). Their enduring
traditional structures and trade forms are now confronted to money-dependent
economic systems (overall urban or peri-urban), where the rules of land
management and the uses of domestic animals and cultivated plants are very
different. The points of contact are brewing sites for biological and social conflicts,
where, the responsibility of decision-makers is all the more difficult. Obviously,
they not only need the confidence of their population, but have to develop an
extremely refined and elaborate sense of balance and justice, using both social and
biological sciences inputs. To confront the biological problems, they need pertinent
26
training, i.e. a strong background in ecology and some conception of the biological
and historical processes that led to current situations.
Values
Perceptions
Biology Economy
Uses
Government
Figure 3: Values and perceptions in biological resources management
PASTORAL
Traditional
knowledge and
agriculture
FORAGING HUNTING
Figure 4: Interconnected traditional economic systems
Sources of biological information and education
As decision-makers have grown to recognise the pressing need for more accurate
and up-to-date biological knowledge, they have begun to bring the same kind of
capacity for communication and inquiry to bear upon biological systems that they
habitually use for economic assessments. With the years, they have developed a
27
variety of approaches that all fit in the framework presented in figure 1: the first
consists in negotiating and financing specific research projects with competitive
expert laboratories. From such research operations, usually carried out over
precisely limited periods of time, they acquire the information they need, plus
relevant biological background and, sometimes, technical expertise for the future.
The second approach is to seek direct recourse to specific education and training
(short-term specialised, advanced training at non-formal institutions, or longer
training courses, often developed by academic institutions). The third approach is to
call upon outside help. This option applies the market technique of buying the
services of specialised consulting agencies. It has the advantage of accessing
biological information through financial exchange, but it does not usually increase
the know-how in the administration. The fourth possibility is the most indirect one.
It relies on social controls and market feed-back on previously implemented
decisions. The arguments cited in favour of controls and feed-back often point out
that alternatives to the debated decisions could have been envisaged at an earlier
stage, if more thorough biological information had been considered. This is quite
often the apparent reasoning behind the texts accompanying court rulings.
Undoubtedly, such feedback is highly informative for administrators. However, the
information comes very late and may follow in the wake of social difficulties that
could have been avoided if a more accurate consideration of biological knowledge
had been taken in the first place.
Recent developments concerning genetically modified organisms GMOs, human

immunodeficiency viruses or prions provide ample illustration of the various
possibilities which are available to administrators to increase their biological
knowledge and optimise their decisions.
It should be emphasised at this point that these processes of learning are not of the
traditional academic nature. In many universities and for many years, biology has, in
general, been presented to students as a qualitative discipline and encyclopaedic
endeavour. Even biochemistry, molecular biology and physiology courses were
more prone to descriptions of mechanisms than to quantifications of their dynamics.
On the other hand: population genetics, population biology, epidemiology and
theoretical biology were, by their essence, obliged to teach mathematical concepts
and techniques. Because of this tradition, the two complexes of biological training
are segregated in different courses. Matters started to improve some 15-20 years
ago, when advances in informatics provided biology with the tools to develop data
banks and data bases as well as with modelling techniques and computing capacities.
While modelling and bioinformatics have acquired some recognition in universities,
they are still in their infancy, and their role and importance are bound to increase.
The trend will be accelerated by the demands of society, especially that of
administrative decision-makers. Indeed, in their profession, they need not only
qualitative knowledge, but also testable scenarios of the costs and effects, as well as
the indirect consequences of any possible decisions. Quantification, modelling and
informatics are precisely the tools that administrative decision-makers use in normal
practise. Since their accustomed entry is via these disciplines, it actually facilitates
28
their access to advanced biological information and education, if quantification

methods are applied.
Risk perception and assessment
In the administrator’s profession, decision-making is accompanied by risks. The

examples cited above (GMOs, HIV, prions) well illustrate this situation, as do the
examples of hormones, antibiotics or dioxin contents in food. Clearly, extensive
biological knowledge is key to a priori or a posteriori risk and crisis management in
any economic operation involving living organisms.
Let us first consider, in very broad terms, how administrators make their decisions
with respect to risks. They look for an optimised position in a triangle of
perceptions, the points of which are: political goals, public response, and judicial
framework (Figure 5). They proceed by trying to mobilise biological knowledge in
three steps. The first is the accurate definition of the pertinent biosystems (actors,
hierarchies, time and spatial scales, human impacts...). In this phase, we again
encounter the type of integrated biological knowledge previously called for (cf.
Figure 2). The ultimate goal, here, is to be able to target the key elements of the
productive biosystem in order to avoid unjustified costs and redundancies. The
second step is to identify the risks, i.e. domains of uncertainties, chaotic or stochastic
processes, and to correlate them with the concerns of society.
PUBLIC
RISKS
Management
POLITICAL JUDICIAL
Figure 5: Perceptions, risks and management
A good example is the case of GMOs, where three major areas of risk are recognised
: (1) the product itself (a living organism or the consequence of its activity); (2) the
technologies (to develop, elaborate, produce and manage GMOs); (3) GMOs’
environmental impact. The last step in the process is the assessment of probabilities,
which is directly related to the quantitative disciplines of biology discussed above.
29
Once this path has been paved and walked, administrators make decisions on the
management of the risks. In this operation, there are two guiding principles: the
lowest ratio of risks /benefits, and the need for a continuous flow of innovations in
order for society to survive and develop in a competitive world. This last part of the
decision-making activity is not directly related to biological knowledge (except
through the cognitive activities of the brain). However, recent developments in the
judicial and political consequences of decisions involving biosystems have tended to
cause more biological elements to be introduced into these decision-making
operations. This brings us back to the earlier discussion about values and perceptions
(Fig. 3). Approaching the end of this century, the control exerted by citizens on
governments and policies has progressively led to a shift from prevention to pre-
caution. In the name of the latter, the responsibilities and ultimately the culpability
of decision-makers have been extended far beyond the actual object of the decisions,
to encompass their general impact on society and the nature of their implementations
(see the HIV and blood transfusion crisis in France and the recent problems of
chemical and hormonal pollutants in food). Consequently, even in the process of risk
assessment, administrators will be prone to found their positions on a more accurate
biological understanding of risks. In the long run, proper biological education may
prepare younger generations of decision-makers to face such tasks. But in the
immediate future, there is a call for the services of experts in biology.
Obviously, biologists are willing to provide their expertise. However, the demands
of today’s society are not often in tune with the overall range of competencies and
capabilities that biologists acquire through higher education and professional
activities. In the scientific community, recognition is acquired through disciplinary
specialisation and peer-review evaluation. Confronted by the same problem,
different biologists may focus on different aspects and issue conflicting views,
according to their specific knowledge. They may end up not rendering the service
expected. Unfortunately, this academic habit of indulging in discussions among
themselves has sometimes been misconstrued in court in order to deny any value to
biological information and expertise... If society is has to succeed in building a
community of true biological experts for the future, professional qualifications
should be carefully debated and defined. Professionals should be trained in both
biology and the social sciences and be made aware of their interconnection.
Development of this corps will also require a definition of the social responsibilities
of its members and as well as of their judicial protection. The question of whether
experts are ordinary citizens is easily posed, but the answers are too many and are, at
present, lacking a consensus in our societies.
To summarise: the future success of administrators and experts in the management

of socio-agro-biosystems is highly dependent upon their biological and social
knowledge and awareness. Possibilities to develop these skills and competencies are
many and diverse. A fundamental, well integrated background in biology and social
sciences is the common feature of these training concepts, within a framework that
conjugates the consideration of facts, the reasoning of theories and the exercise of
doubts.
30
Suggestions for improved connections between biological knowledge and

decisions-making processes
In order to promote a better reciprocal understanding between biologists and

administrative decision-makers and prepare both groups to face adequately the
changes of biotechnologies and bioevolutions of the next century, this summary and
qualitative survey points to three basic needs: a need for accessible biological
information, a need for more accurate and open education, and a need for more
vigilant awareness and active citizenship on the part of individuals of the two
communities. With a view towards the follow-up of the BioEd 2000 conference, one
might conclude by formulating two clusters of suggestions relating to biology and
decision-making:
1) New ways to teach and understand biology and society

Education should be concerned with biosystems and the integrative sciences
necessary to analyse, formalise and manage their complexities. This will be achieved
when syllabuses and curricula of Integrative Biology are developed. By nature,
biosystems are diverse and tend to diversify. Social needs are likewise diverse and
changing, driven by two different forces: the trend toward globalisation, and the
trend towards development of cultural identities and the search for new spaces of
freedom. In consequence, the idea of building up a unique and universally
acceptable curriculum of Integrative Biology is not the answer to all the challenges.
On the contrary, a plurality of non-centralized syllabi has to be elaborated through
democratic processes and geared to respond to specific social expectations and
biosystems properties. The integrative approaches will succeed in (and in return:
benefit from) implementations attuned to local and national situations, structures and
demands. These various endeavours share four basic principles:
- meshing biological and social approaches and disciplines;
- teaching intellectual doubt and developing capability for synthesis in
conjunction with one field of specific expertise that will qualify the
individual at the best possible level. In this respect, Integrative Biology is
far removed from any brand of soothing, generalizing holism.
- providing various keys for decision-making and choosing among solution
options;
- serving society’s needs and future.
In theory, there is no obstacle to taking these principles into account in the

remodelling of existing education structures,
- whether they are formal or non -formal,
- whether they address adults in their professional activities, children in
elementary and secondary schools, or students of the higher education
systems,
- whether they have short-term training goals (a few weeks to one year) or
far-ranging objectives (engineering qualifications, Ph. D. diplomas...).
- whether they have already targeted very specific biosystems (specific seed
production, for instance) or very large polymorphic ones (regional
managements, peri-urban societies,...)
31
2) The democratic prerequisites for success

Although we cannot formally prove it, successful implementation of Integrative
Biology concepts and a better reciprocal understanding between administrators and
biologists depend on more dialogue and contractual practices (as opposed to rigid
set-ups) at the three following levels : internal debate of individuals (doubts),
community dialogues and negotiation processes; local national and international
negotiations with a view towards enhancing democracy and justice.
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Quentin en Yvelines , France, 23-27 juin 1996, 13p.
32
Ecology Teaching in India and in

Developing Countries
by P.S. Ramakrishnan
School of Environmental Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi 110067, India. E-mail: psrama@jnuniv.ernet.in
Introduction
Ecology teaching in biological sciences in our University system has to undergo

very drastic changes, if it has to keep pace with developments in ecological
paradigms in a biophysical sense, and emerging paradigms towards a holistic
ecology that link-up ecological with social processes, an area which is relevant to
India and the developing world. The beginning towards holism in Indian ecology
was made in the early 1970s, with the work on shifting agriculture linked land use
systems and their management in north-eastern hill regions of India (Ramakrishnan,
1992a).
Unfortunately, much of our curricula are driven by traditional ecological paradigms

developed in the western world starting with the classical work of Clements (1916)
and subsequently elaborated through temperate world natural ecosystem analysis
(Odum, 1971). Biophysical ecology itself has undergone distinct shifts in paradigm,
during the last few decades, from a predator/consumer controlled ecosystem
dynamics to one where disturbance is a key element integrated into ecosystem
functioning. With emerging interest in the human dimensions of ecology, it is
important that we, in the developing world, capitalize upon the initial advantage that
we have had in linking up natural with social sciences. This is critical for us, since
our natural ecosystems have been largely degraded, and what we have been left with
are confined largely to upland areas where highly traditional societies live. Much of
what we have in the more populated fertile plains of a country like India are natural
forest ecosystems degraded into poorly managed grasslands or vast landscapes of
human-managed agroecosystems. It is in this context the following discussions
become relevant.
Traditional rural societies as part of ecosystem functions
If we look at a country like India, only about 25% of the humans live in urban
situations. The remaining 75% are 'traditional' agriculture driven rural communities
in the plains or more 'traditional' upland societies practicing traditional multi-species
complex agroecosystems closely linked with the forest resources on which they
depend for a variety of their needs (Ramakrishnan, 1992a, 1994, 1999). It is
important to realize that all traditional societies have some common characteristics:
(I) ecosystem and social systems function as a unified whole, (ii) with a two-way
interaction between these two, traditional societies emphasize upon ecological
prudence to cope up with uncertainties in the environment, and (iii) therefore, the
33
emphasis is on diversification of their landscape rather than upon homogenization.

One of the chief drivers of land use decisions for these rural societies often are a
number of codified and not so often codified institutional arrangements, for
sustainable use of their natural resources; biodiversity centred traditional ecological
knowledge (TEK) often determine land use decisions. Therefore, socio-economic
and socio-cultural dimensions have to be viewed as closely linked to ecological
issues, institutions forming the connecting link.
Firstly, therefore, ecology teaching has to lay more emphasis on agroecosystem

structure and functioning to illustrate many of the ecological principles; there are a
few hundred typologies of traditional agroecosystems ranging between casually
managed swidden agriculture on the one extreme, a variety of other agroforestry
systems that are moderately managed, and the more intensely managed high energy
input modern agriculture (Ramakrishnan, 1992a; Ramakrishnan et. al., 1998, 2000).
Secondly, natural forest ecosystem analysis in our teaching curricula should
emphasize upon our own forest ecosystems linked to a variety of agroecosystem
types, as part of mountain landscape analysis (Ramakrishnan, 1992a,b;
Ramakrishnan et. al., 1996a,b).
Linking ecological with social processes through TEK
Ethnobiology started off being descriptive, as an appendage to classical taxonomy and

systematic biology essentially listing species collected from the wild and used by traditional
societies. It is only in recent times that the scientists interested in ethnobiology have started
looking at the dynamics of the relationships existing between individual species and
populations, ecosystems and landscapes (Fig. 1). Further, it is only recently that the
interest in TEK has moved in the direction of understanding the interconnections that often
exist between ecological and social processes, determining the functional attributes of
ecosystems/ landscapes. The way in which traditional societies, (a) perceive and
manipulate biodiversity around them in the landscape, both in space and time, to ensure
ecosystem stability and resilience, and (b) have evolved sound eco-technologies to deal with
land use management issues such as soil fertility and soil water regimes, to cite two
examples, are now being seen as critical for managing natural resources sustainably, with
peoples' participation, more importantly in the context of 'global change' (Ramakrishnan et.
al., 1996a, b). Many of these ecological knowledge of traditional societies is often
embedded in their belief system (Ramakrishnan et. al., 1998). At the rate at which 'global
change' is occurring, a major proportion of all species on earth will be lost over the next
century, and yet it is those species that we need to build a secure future. Therefore, the
renewed interest in ethnobiology in its broadest sense. There is also an increasing
realization that in many ecological/social situations, TDK should be an integral part of a
holistic and cost-effective approach to sustainable development.
The important point in all this effort is to build up linkages between system level
research with process level understanding, with a view to evolve strategies for better
management of natural resources. The schematic diagram (Fig. 2) developed for soil
fertility management through internal strengthening of soil biological processes,
rather than depending upon external energy subsidies alone, as part of the Tropical
Soil Biology and Fertility programme (TSBF) is an effective approach to teach
34
ecology, with adequate concerns for the human dimensions of the subject. Whilst
doing this, it is equally important to look at the interconnections that exist between
ecological and social systems, using traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) as the
connecting link for sustainable management of natural resources with livelihood
concerns of societies involved (Fig. 3).
Fig. 1. Ethnobiological approaches towards descriptive (dotted arrows) and process

(solid arrows) level analysis of ecosystem/social system complexities
Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)
Protected cultural units

Cultural
Ecosystem /Landscape functions
Range of agro ecosystems in

varied habitats
Socio-Economic
Selective process in space and
time
Socially valued species/

functional
Social
Their ecological attributes
(keystone?)
Food/medicinal spp.
Anthropologic
Spp. Organization in managed
ecosystem
Descriptive (Largely Social)

Process-linked (Socio-ecologic)
Landscape ecology: the appropriate basis for linking ecological

with social processes
A landscape unit in the a developing country context such as India has two
important components - (a) human-managed agroecosystems, plantation forests, etc.
and (b) natural ecosystems, such as forests, mangroves, water bodies, etc. If
sustainable livelihood/development of the predominantly rural societies in a
developing country context is to be the basis for teaching ecology, as it should be,
then, a set of interconnected ecosystem types in a landscape has to be the basic unit
for any meaningful ecological or socio-economic analysis and evaluation.
35
Fig. 2. Building interconnections between systems and process level analysis in

understanding soil biological processes and sustainable soil fertility (from
Ramakrishnan et. al., 1993)
SYSTEM RESEARCH PROCESS RESEARCH
Identify resources
and environments Define resource qualities
and characteristics
Study resources use

practices, constraints and Describe resources
opportunities transformation processes
Model decision-making
processes and system-level Model resource dynamics
regulators and process regulators
Develop elements of
Test and develop improved improved resource use
management practices practice
36
Fig. 3. Integrating elements involved in linking up ecological and social systems,

with sustainable livelihood/development concerns of traditional societies
ECOLOGICAL BOXES SOCIAL BOXES
Plot level Plot level societal

Agroecosystem responses
analysis
Plot level forest Societal perceptions

System analysis of agro-forest
linkages
Soil fertility Societal perceptions

nutrient of species/ecosystems
cycling issues
Ecosystem Humans as
Functioning integrated within
ecosystem
Landscape level Ecological landscape

analysis and as part of cultural
functions landscape
Biophysical Social & institutional

Indicators of indicators of
Sustainability sustainability
Short-term : sustainable
livelihood
Long-term : sustainable
regional development
37
Agroecosystems
Agriculture, forestry and fisheries are traditional activities in the rural environment of
the Asian tropics. Forest conversion has been accelerated by activities associated with
rapid industrialization. Much conversion is due primarily to the extraction of timber for
industrial uses, and some to meet the needs of the rural poor, for food, fodder, and
firewood. The result is extensive degraded systems (Ramakrishnan et.al., 1994b),
which now represents over 1/3rd of the irrigated agricultural land, about 1/2 of the rain-
fed agricultural land, and almost 3/4 of the pastoral land.
Inspite of this scenario, agriculture is an important economic activity for a large

population of the developing tropics. However, a large proportion of the farming
community still operate at low levels of productivity and management. Even where
'green revolution' has contributed towards increased food production and has lead to
national level self-sufficiency as in India, it still is confined to a small section of the
society (Ramakrishnan, 1993; Ramakrishnan,1999) and has had its negative
environmental impacts as well. These negative impacts are both biophysical, such as
organic carbon depletion, increased soil salinity, drastic changes in soil water regimes,
chemical pollution due to fertilizer and pesticidal applications, and social disruptions
leading to marginalization of a large segment of the farming communities due to limited
access to energy inputs that sustain modern agriculture.
Thus, on the one hand we have a monoculture production system, that is market driven,
using genetically engineered uniformity in organisms of a few crop species that could
be manipulated under ecological conditions that maximizes output. On the other hand,
are over 1.4 billion people (Wolf, 1986) in the developing world are involved in a whole
variety of low input multi-species complex agroecosystems, operating under difficult
ecological and/or socio-economic circumstances (Fig. 4). Essentially based on
traditional technologies developed on the basis of empirical knowledge accumulated
over a long period of time, the traditional societies involved have learnt to use crop and
associated biodiversity in a variety of ways to strengthen the internal processes that
determine stability and resilience of these systems. The emphasis here is not so much on
high production but more towards coping with uncertainties in the environment (system
resilience), under not so favourable ecological situations in which they operate.
With ‘global change’, such as large-scale deforestation for meeting industrial needs,
over-exploitation of land for agriculture by ever increasing population, the associated
decline in biodiversity, soil erosion and nutrient losses, and site desertification on a
scale that is unprecedented, impacting upon these systems in a variety of different ways
affecting ecosystem complexity (Sala et. al., 1999), two questions become critical. How
do we reconcile the productivity concerns with agricultural system resilience? How do
we handle our concern for sustainable agriculture in the context of 'global change'
(climate change, biodiversity depletion, biological invasion by exotic species, land
degradation and desertification)? These are the kind of concerns with which we in India
are trying to grapple, on the basis of many initiatives (Ramakrishnan et. al., 1996b).
38
Forest ecosystems
Tropical forests, an important natural resource used traditionally on a sustainable basis by

the local communities, are currently under serious threat due to over-exploitation.
Ironically, deforestation carried out in the name of 'development' has led to a steady
erosion of the very life support base of the vast majority of the people in the tropics,
causing social disruption. Conservation and management represent two sides of the same
coin and need to be tackled through a broadly-based interdisciplinary approach with
interacting components; sylvicultural, ecological, social and economic (Ramakrishnan,
1992b). Only such a strategy would ensure people's participation and ecologically
sustainable management of this valuable resource.
Fig. 4. Traditional multi-species agroecosystem complexity linking biodiversity with

productivity (from Swift and Ingram, 1996)
Diversity of Production System
Multi-Field Types Single-Field Type
High Shiftin Traditional Home

D Cultivation Compound Farm Garden
i
v Nomadic Rotational
e Pastoralism Fallow
r
Savanna
s
Mixed Farming
i
t Horticulture Multi-Cropping
y
Compound Pasture
Agribusiness Mixed Farming
o
f Alley
Farming Alley Cropping
s
p Crop Rotation Intercropping
e
c Plantations &
i Orchards
e
s Intensive
Cereal
Low
39
Ecological inputs are important for determining management decisions. Knowledge from
areas such as tree biology and architecture, patch dynamics, ecophysiology of developing
forest communities, reproductive biology and nutrient cycling processes could all be
integrated into the current management process and future management options. In such an
integrated approach to management, the socio-economic and socio-cultural issues and
TEK coming from the local communities need to be reconciled. This is seen from our
north-east Indian case study, where the sustainability criterion was the touchstone for
designing management strategies (Ramakrishnan, 1992a). Mobilizing the local community
in model studies on forest restoration and catchment protection, rainwater harvesting and
its distribution, and in a variety of related eco-developmental work arising out of
watershed management (e.g. agriculture, agroforestry, horticulture, animal husbandry,
bamboo plantation and bamboo-based artisanal activities) have been done in the
Himalayan and sub-Himalayan tracts of India by the present author and his colleagues.
Local involvement was made possible on the basis of a value system that they understand
and appreciate, through direct interaction with villagers, through NGOs or through
organized village-level societies.
Landscape Mosaic
Realizing that biodiversity does contribute in a variety of ways to ecosystem functions

(Gliessman, 1990; Ramakrishnan, 1992a) and that agroecosystems do harbour a great
deal of biodiversity valuable for human welfare (Pimental et. al., 1992), it is
reasonable that we go in for a mosaic of natural ecosystems coexisting with a wide
variety of agroecosystem models derived through all the three pathways. Such a highly
diversified landscape unit is likely to have a wide range of ecological niches conducive
to enhancing biodiversity and at the same time ensure sustainability of the managed
landscape itself; what we have now represents the other extreme with miles and miles
of ecologically non-sustainable human-altered agricultural mono-cropping systems.
Traditionally, many societies have viewed their land use activity in a given landscape as
part of an integrated land use management, wherein human managed ecosystems are
closely linked to a variety of natural systems (Ramakrishnan, 1992a; Ramakrishnan et.
al., 1998, 2000). The diversity of cropping and resource systems that form part of the
landscape serves not only as a major means of protecting ecological integrity at the
landscape level, but also acts as the knowledge and resource base that makes
adaptivity possible; traditional societies adapt their land use practices both in space and
time to cope up with uncertainties in the environment and/or to capture market
opportunities (Ramakrishnan, 1992a, 1999; Brookfield and Padoch, 1994). Such an
adaptability is feasible from the already conserved diversity readily available at the
landscape level.
The concept of 'sacred groves' (patches of forests strictly protected and conserved for
religious or cultural reasons), as typical examples of protected ecosystems were often
part of each village unit (Ramakrishnan, 1992a; Ramakrishnan et. al., 1998), though this
value system has been on the decline under the onslaught from the so called
'modernisation' phenomena. Indeed, many traditional societies even had large sacred
landscape units: eg., the sacred Ganga river mega-watershed in northern India or the
40
'Demajong' landscape covering many altitudinal zones ranging from the alpine to the
sub-tropical rain forest zone in eastern Himalayan Sikkim, and many sacred mountains
in the tropical world(Messerli and Ives, 1997). In these landscape systems, traditional
societies had their own way of making subtle distinctions between permissible small-
scale perturbations and the tabooed large-scale perturbations, about which modern
ecologists have started paying attention only during the last few decades (Ramakrishnan
et. al. 1998). Indeed, the more recently evolved 'biosphere reserve' concept of
UNESCO, is indeed a rediscovery of the 'sacred landscape' concept of many traditional
societies dating back to antiquity, is an attempt towards an integrated management
strategy to conserve natural resources for sustainable use, with inter-generational equity
concerns.
Landscape management demands a variety of responses that are location-specific, in

terms of land use activities linked with natural resource management such as, hydrology
regime, sustainable soil fertility, biodiversity and biomass production. Whilst dealing
with sustainable rural development in the Asian tropics under monsoonic climate, we
have shown that water could be a powerful triggering agent for sustainable land use
development (Ramakrishnan et. al., 1994a,b). Linking up traditional ecological
knowledge and technologies in rain water harvesting and adapting them to meet with
contemporary needs is an approach that was taken in the arid regions of Rajasthan in
India, by an NGO organization 'Tarun Bharat Sangh', for reviving half a dozen of the
already dried up rivers and thus developing the water resource base of this arid zone,
through a revival of traditional dug out water harvesting tanks locally called 'Johads'
(Singh, 1999). Through a series of over 2500 tanks and small engineering structures
erected for soil conservation and increasing rain water seepage into the soil, this NGO
organization has been able to regenerate a few thousand square kilometers of land area
with good forest cover, increase agricultural production through redeveloped
agroecosystems, improve wildlife, and provide a better quality of life to hundreds of
villages. The basic tenet which was the driving force in this effort was small-scale
operations that are location-specific, through community participation ensured through a
variety of institutional arrangements arrived through a participatory mode. In this
situation and in all other similar landscape situations, maintenance of the overall
sustainability of the systems demand a loosely coupled management (Ehrenfeld, 1991),
specifically designed to accommodate large variability in ecosystem complexity within
a landscape mosaic.
How do we connect biodiversity, TEK and landscape dynamics with

sustainable development?
I shall illustrate the interconnections using just one example. In the Central Himalayan
region, are a set of culturally valued Quercus species, around which the local communities
have many, folk stories, dance, music and poetry, since antiquity. This set of socially
selected species are shown to be ecologically significant keystone species, which trigger a
whole variety of soil biological processes, which in turn contribute to a rich associated
biodiversity in the ecosystem (Fig. 5). Further, the organic litter from them and the
associated biodiversity that they support is the key for sustainable mountain agriculture,
41
also acting as a trigger for ecosystem rehabilitation with community participation. We have
also shown that water, through cheap rain water harvesting tanks, acts as a trigger for the
regeneration of this species (Ramakrishnan, 1992a; Ramakrishnan et. al., 2000), and these
species in turn themselves contribute towards improved soil water balance!
Fig. 5. Traditional ecological knowledge, as a trigger for redeveloping ecosystem

complexity, with concerns for sustainable livelihood/development of traditional
mountain societies
Sustainable Livelihood/Development
Agroecosystem Ecosystem
redevelopment rehabilitation
Increased biodiversity
Altered nutrient
cycling properties
Improved water balance Improved soil

(Oak in Central Himalaya) fertility
Socially selected keystone

Species (TEK)
In the ultimate analysis, social processes involved in developing TDK at all scalar
dimensions, both in space and time should be reconciled with adaptation of traditional eco-
technologies such as water harvesting, show an interesting interconnection between
biodiversity, land use dynamics and sustainable natural resource management with
concerns for societal welfare.
How do we operationalize ecological holism in teaching ?
42
Linkages between natural sciences and social sciences is a process of constant interaction,
and involves moving back and forth between the ecological and social boxes (Fig. 4). One
could move from a plot level analysis of natural and human-managed ecosystems, through
a ecosystem level analysis of the ecological and social processes involved, moving on to an
understanding of the sustainability considerations at the landscape level. Such a linkage
analysis between natural and social sciences alone will be meaningful towards designing
short-term strategies for sustainable livelihood of rural communities of the developing
world, and for making long-term plans for sustainable regional development.
References
Brookfield, H. & Padoch, C. 1994. Appreciating biodiversity: A look at the dynamism and
diversity of indigenous farming practices. Environment, 36: 6 - 11, 37 - 45.
Clements, F.E. 1916. Plant Succession Analysis of the Development of Vegetation. Publ.
Carnegie Inst., Washington, 242: 1-512 (reprinted Edition, 1928. Plant Succession and
Indicators. Wilson, New York)
Ehrenfeld, D. 1991. The management of biodiversity: A conservation paradox. In: F.H
Bormann and S.R. Kellert (Eds.) Ecology, Economics, Ethics: The Broken Circle. pp. 26-39.
Yale Univ. Press, New Haven.
Gliessman, S.R. 1990. Agroecology: Researching the Ecological Basis of Sustainable
Agriculture. Ecol. Studies 78, Springer-Verlag, New York. 380 pp.
Odum, E.P. 1971. Fundamentals of Ecology. W.B. Saunders Co., Philadelhia. 574pp.
Messerli, B. and Ives, J.D. 1997. Mountains of the World. Parthenon Publ., Carnforth, Lancs.,
U.K. 495 pp.
Pimental, D.A., Stachow, U., Takacs, D.A., Brubaker, H.W., Dumas, A.R., Meaney, J.J., ONeil,
J.A.S., Onsi, D.E. and Corzilius, D.B. 1992. Conserving biodiversity in agricultural and
forestry systems. Bioscience, 42: 354-364.
Ramakrishnan, P.S. 1992a. Shifting Agriculture and Sustainable Development: An
Interdisciplinary Study from North-Eastern India. UNESCO-MAB Series, Paris, Parthenon
Publ., Carnforth, Lancs. U.K. 424 pp. (republished by Oxford University Press, New Delhi
1993).
Ramakrishnan, P.S. 1992b. Tropical forests: Exploitation, conservation and management. Impact of
Science on Society, 42: 149-162.
Ramakrishnan, P.S. 1994. Participatory development in managing population pressure on natural
resources. In: R. Krishnan (Ed.). Growing Numbers and Dwindling Resources. pp. 86-96. Tata
Energy Research Inst., New Delhi.
Ramakrishnan, P.S. 1999. The impact of globalisation on agricultural systems of traditional
societies. In: A.K. Dragun and C. Tisdell (Eds.). Sustainable Agriculture and Environment:
Globalization and the Impact of Trade Liberalisation. pp. 185-200. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham,
U.K.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Saxena, K.G., Swift, M.J. and Seward, P.D. 1993. Tropical Soil Biology
and Fertility Research: South Asian Context. Himasvikas Publ. 4, Oriental Enterprises, Dehra
Dun. 147 pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Purohit, A.N., Saxena, K.G. and Rao, K.S. 1994a. Himalayan
Environment and Sustainable Development. Diamond Jubilee Publ., Indian Nat. Sci. Acad.,
New Delhi. 84pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Campbell, J., Demierre, L., Gyi, A., Malhotra, K.C., Mehndiratta, S., Rai,
S.N., & Sashidharan, E.M. 1994b. Ecosystem Rehabilitation of the Rural Landscape in South
43
and Central Asia: An Analysis of Issues. Special Publication, UNESCO (ROSTCA), New
Delhi. 29pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Purohit, A.N. Saxena, K.G., Rao, K.S. and Maikhuri, R.K. 1996a.
Conservation and Management of Biological Resources in Himalaya. G.B. Pant Inst. of
Himalayan Environment & Development, Kosi, Almora and Oxford & IBH Publ., New Delhi.
601 pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Das, A.K., and Saxena, K.G. 1996b. Conserving Biodiversity for
Sustainable Development. Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi. 246 pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Saxena, K.G. and Chandrasekara, U. l998. Conserving the Sacred: For
Biodiversity Management. Sacred: For Biodiversity Management. UNESCO and Oxford &
IBH, New Delhi. 480 pp.
Ramakrishnan, P.S., Chandrashekara, U.M., Elaouard, C., Guilmoto, C.Z., Maikhuri, R.K., Rao,
K.S., Sankar, S. and Saxena, K.G. 2000. Mountain Biodiversity, Land Use Dynamics and
Traditional Ecological Knowledge. UNESCO and Oxford IBH, New Delhi. 353 pp.
Sala, O.E., Chapin III, F.S., Gardner, R.H., Lauenroth, W.K., Mooney, H.A. and Ramakrishnan,
P.S. 1999. Global change, biodiversity and ecological complexity. In: B. Walker, W. Steffen, J.
Canadell and J. Ingram (Eds.). The Terrestrial Biosphere and Global Change. pp. 304-328.
International Geosphere Biosphere Programme Book Series. 4, Cambridge Univ. Press,
Cambridge.
Singh, R. 1999. The role of NGOs interested in the issues of regenerating and developing the
traditional water harvesting systems. In: (Eds. N. Talebbeydokhti, A. Talveri and S.A.
Heydarian).UNESCO Regional Workshop Proceedings: Traditional Water Harvesting Sytems.
pp. 205-212. Dept. of Watershed Mangement, Govt. of Iran, Tehran
Swift, M.J. and Ingram, J.S.I. 1996. Effects of Global Change on Multi-species Agroecosystems:
Implementation Plan. GCTE Report No. 13, Global Change & Terrestrial Ecosystem Focus 3
Office, Wallingford, U.K. 56 pp.
Wolf, E.C. 1986. Beyond the Green Revolution: New Approaches for Third World Agriculture.
World Watch Institute, Washington DC.
44
Endangered Resources:
Biodiversity and Cultural Knowledge.
by Promila Kapoor-Vijay and Stephen Blackmore
Department of Botany, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road,
South Kensington. London SW7 5BD, UK
A fundamental distinction is often made between the science of the natural world and
traditional or ethnobiological systems of knowledge. We question the validity of this
distinction. Both systems share a common origin and arise from our innate human
behaviour of exploring, characterising and communicating about the world around us.
Both have equal validity. However, even when the importance of traditional knowledge
is explicitly recognised, as it is in Article 8 of the Convention on Biological Diversity, it
is rarely given the attention it deserves and must always defer to science. One of the
most important advantages of taxonomy, the scientific system of naming and classifying
biological diversity, is that it aims to provide a unique, distinctive name for each
species. It has long been recognised that the “international language” of taxonomy
enables scientists around the world to communicate and share information about
species. Nevertheless, the common language of taxonomic names has generally been
seen as superior to, or more correct than, traditional names. This attitude tends to
marginalize traditional knowledge and misses the point that it is only through taxonomic
nomenclature that we connect together all that we have learnt about biodiversity.
The dazzling diversity of species found on Earth is the result of millions of years of
evolution. This biological diversity underpins the economic wealth of our planet
providing all of our food, many medicines and numerous other materials. The range of
species used by people continues to increase as our exploration of biodiversity
progresses. Not only is biodiversity a repository for genetic information gained through
the long and incompletely understood processes of biological evolution, it provides
vital ecological services and it enriches the aesthetics of our environment.
Culture and language are also repositories for information gained through social
development and diversification in ways that are broadly analogous to biological
evolution. Like biological diversity, linguistic and cultural diversity have incalculable
value to present and future generations. Just as human lives are impoverished by the
loss of species, so too are they diminished by the erosion and loss of culture and
language. This loss depletes the store of information as surely as the loss of biological
diversity. And just as biodiversity research can lead to the identification of useful,
species, genes or compounds, so can local knowledge about tropical forest plants or
crop varieties. Human cultures and languages are disappearing rapidly, and this loss is
as grave as the loss of biological diversity it parallels. Frequently, both losses are inter-
related, especially when habitat conversion impacts both on landscape and indigenous
peoples.
45
The Convention on Biological Diversity embodies a world wide consensus on the need
to respond to the loss of biological diversity. The corresponding challenge of conserving
cultural and linguistic diversity has yet to be adequately addressed and neither have the
links to biodiversity been fully appreciated. Although indigenous people, their
advocates, and social scientists are acutely aware of the losses, there is as yet no
political consensus on how to address this problem or how to conserve cultural
knowledge. The dynamics of political and social systems make it far more difficult to
design programmes of cultural conservation than it is to establish protected areas or to
achieve ex situ conservation in botanical gardens, zoos or seed banks. Cultural
knowledge cannot adequately be conserved by setting it aside in a museum or by
recording it, whether on a paper or electronically. Like biological diversity, traditional,
ethnobiological knowledge can only be conserved by keeping it alive and in use.
Traditional knowledge of biodiversity concerns plants and animals and their uses as
perceived by the local and or indigenous people of a given area. Having evolved over
the millennia it encapsulates accumulated experience, abstracted in the form of
appropriate systems of local names and folklore. Such indigenous systems include the
botanical or pharmaceutical lexicons of peasants and tribal people, the farmer’s
knowledge of soils, they hunter’s knowledge of animals, the baker’s knowledge of yeast
and dough and the shaman’s ability to read oracle bones. Two definitions of indigenous
knowledge have been proposed by Brush (1996): (i) Broadly defined, indigenous
knowledge is the systematic information that remains in the diverse social structures. It
is usually unwritten and preserved only through oral tradition; (ii) Narrowly defined, it
refers to the knowledge system of indigenous people and minority cultures.
Some ancient records concerning knowledge of biological diversity have been

preserved, for example, the Indian Vedas, the ancient Chinese herbal Pen ts’ao kang m,
and Egyptian scrolls concerning medicinal and other plant uses (Schultes and von Reis,
1995). In one sense this is hardly surprising, the oldest and fundamental knowledge for
human survival concerns the characteristics and properties of organisms. Knowing
which species are beneficial and which are harmful is now, and always has been, a
matter of life and death. These ancient insights into medical knowledge are carefully
studied by the ethnobiologist. The pre-requisite of all these studies is diligent gathering
and pooling of knowledge existing with indigenous folks and traditional groups of
people. Important written sources include works of sacred scriptures (eg., Vedic texts
and Ayurvedic treatises) and other indigenous medical systems. But much such
knowledge is not written down and survives only in the oral culture of local people.
Even in ancient times, sages, including Charak and Susruta, mentioned that medical
herbs and plants should be recognised and identified with the help of cowherds, hermits,
huntsmen, forest dwellers and those who cull the fruits and edible roots of the forest.
Botany, the scientific study of plants, has been approached from two divergent
viewpoints; the philosophical and the utilitarian. From the first point of view, botany
stands on its own merit as an integral branch of natural philosophy, but when regarded
from the second it is the source of origin for medicine, agriculture and industry. It is
possible to trace the development of these two lines of enquiry from classical times and
46
to see how one or the other has predominated and that although they have converged
they have often, to their detriment, followed unconnected routes (Arber, 1986).
To the ancient Greek authors Dioscorides, Theophrastus and Aristotle each plant had a
soul or psyche, an idea which later European thinking inherited. The science of
ethnobotany developed by Western scientists built on these classical Greek writings on
the therapeutic efficacy of plants. Indeed, formal systems such as Linnean binomial
nomenclature and western pharmacology originated in the indigenous knowledge
system (Atran, 1987).
Other cultures have developed ethnobotanical knowledge by different routes. The

discovery, enumeration, and evaluations of uses of plants in primitive societies has been
described by Shultes and Von Reis (1995). Anthropologists and linguists have
documented the breadth, complexity, regularities, and usefulness of indigenous
knowledge (Berlin, 1992). Although different concepts are often employed, indigenous
knowledge shares these attributes with formal scientific knowledge systems. The
Mayan folk classification of plants, for example, is no less systematic than the latest
scientific classifications based largely on analyses of DNA sequences. Typically,
however, indigenous knowledge is more accessible and freely shared within local
communities (Berlin, Raven, and Breedlove, 1974), providing that their cultural
traditions persist..
Unfortunately, there remains little interaction between the scientific classification of

biodiversity and traditional cultural knowledge. Taxonomy has now provided names for
about 1.7 million species out of an estimated total that might be as many as 13 million
species. No doubt there are many species recognised and named in traditional systems
of classification that have not yet been described by science. In many cases even when
a species has been formally described under the internationally agreed rules of scientific
nomenclature, science knows nothing more about it than the time and place where it
was collected.
We see the opportunity, created by the Convention on Biological Diversity, for a new
and vital rapprochement and synthesis between scientific classification and traditional
knowledge of plants and animals as captured in myriads of cultural practices, folklore,
and indigenous language systems. There is a direct relationship between knowledge
and classification based on folklore and taxonomy. Bulmer (1969) pointed out that, “If
folk taxonomy bore no relation to scientific taxonomy, but was entirely based on
biologically arbitrary but culturally relevant discrimination, there would be no point in
obtaining biological identification for the creatures and plants concerned, no way of
relating biological information about them to ethnographic information about the uses to
which they were put or the manner in which men conceptualised them”. Berlin(1992)
has indicated a strong need for linking the scientific and folk systems of classification.
Example of such links have been quoted by Berlin(1992) who has looked at the
relationship between folk names and scientific names. Thus in this relationship Berlin
has observed that Lantana, a genus in Verbenaceae can be identified by local Tzeltal
Maya people, but the local name given ‘ch’ilwet’ actually is for five different species of
47
Lantana. Similar studies made by Kapoor( 1978) and Pratap and Kapoor(1985) on
Chenopodium species in India have shown that several species of Chenopodium
including C. album and C. murale are known as bithu or bathu by the local rural
communities in northern India especially North West Himalayas. Himalayan cultivated
forms of C. album are referred to by hilly communities called kauna. Interestingly this
name is closer to C. quinoa a native food crop in Latin American countries Mexico,
Bolivia, Peru etc.
The opportunity exits for connecting up all human experiences and knowledge of the
diversity of the natural world through the medium of scientific names for species. This
is particularly timely given the increasing use of computerised information systems as a
means of accessing information about species. In many cases it would not be possible
to provide a direct one to one correspondence between culturally important organisms
and scientific names. The units recognised in cultural classifications do necessarily
correspond to a particular species, or to units, such as genera or families in the higher
classification. In fact, scientific concepts of what constitutes a species are not precisely
fixed. In practise many species have been given more than one scientific (synonyms)
and rules of nomenclature exist to establish which should be correctly applied.
Furthermore, scientists differ in their circumscription of genera, families and more
inclusive groups. These complexities requires computerised information systems to
accommodate different systems of classification and to provide links between the
known synonyms of species. Thus, establishing the correspondences between cultural
information about species and their scientific names merely extends an existing
challenge for such systems. Given the recently announced intention of the OECD
nations to create a Global Biodiversity Information Facility, it is important that
emphasis be placed on the inclusion of traditional names in this system. In the long run
this will contribute to the empowerment of all people to access scientific information
about species via whatever names they are familiar with. Furthermore, it will be one
contribution to the ex situ preservation of endangered cultural knowledge. By including
such information the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, and related projects, can
be important components in achieving the kind of benefit sharing envisaged under the
Convention on Biological Diversity.
References
Atran,S. 1987. “Origins of the Species and Genus concepts: An Anthropological Perspective.”
Journal of the History of Biology. 20.195-279.
Berlin,B. 1992 Ethnobiological Classification: Principles of Categorization of Plants and
Animals in Traditional Societies. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.
Berlin,B, D.E. Breedlove and P.H.Raven 1973 General Principles of Classification and
Nomenclature in Folk Biology. Amer. Anthro. 75: 214-42.
Berlin,B., P. Raven., and D. Breedlove .1974. Principles of Tzeltal Plant Classification: An
Introduction to Botanical Ethnography of a Mayan Speaking Community in Highland Ciapas.
New York: Academic Press.
Brush,S.B. and Stabinsky,D.1996. Valuing Local Knowledge. Island Press.
Schultes, R.A. and Siri von Reis 1995. Ethnobotany Evolution of a Discipline. Chapman
and Hall.
48
Changing Trends in Biology Education:

An International Perspective
By Faquir C. Vohra
Secretary General, IUBS Commission for Biological Education (CBE)
Introduction
Biology as the study of animals and plants has been an integral component of all cultures and
religions. The folklore is rich in stories of animals conveying distinct messages of accepted
ethics and morals. There is a wealth of traditional knowledge of living things amongst people of
all continents. Knowledge relating specifically to healing and harmful properties of local fauna
and flora has been passed from generation to generation as part of our heritage through non-
formal education and training for life in the community. With modernization has come
specialization whereby people are trained to do different jobs in the community. Thus
education, once the responsibility of the community, came to be regarded as a special purview
of teachers to be had only in schools. As a consequence, biological knowledge as part of the
cultural heritage for survival lost much of its significance.
In many countries of Africa, the Arab States, Asia and Latin America, there is usually a single
centralized curriculum designed for urban and rural children alike with a view to avoid
discrimination and provide equality of opportunity. Within this curriculum, biology is rarely
taught as a distinct subject at the primary and lower secondary levels. Instead, it is usually
offered as a part of environmental or nature study at the former and as general or integrated
science at the latter stage. It is only at the secondary stage that we find biology as a well-
established school curricular discipline in most educational systems with public and institutional
support. Science as part of general education has always been viewed as a subject of life-long
utility in school curricula. Biology, by virtue of its usefulness in everyday life and in
sociocultural change, forms an integral component of almost all school science courses.
Recently, the trend in many countries has been to switch to environmental studies with
curricular content based mainly on three clusters: living things, matter and energy, and earth and
universe.
Traditional Setting
In the traditional setting, the scope of school biology education was rather limited. As an elitist
subject, it catered to select students who were intending to become either research scientists or
medical practitioners. Accordingly, school biology courses concentrated on describing the
structure and function of selected types of organisms representing various levels of biological
organisation. Biology was taught as an experimental science with emphasis on biological
principles to bring out similarities between organisms. In the 1960s, following the lead of the
NSF supported Biological Sciences Curricular Study (BSCS) in the United States and the
Nuffield Science Programme in the United Kingdom, many countries reoriented their biology
education in terms of what biologists actually do. Methods of developing and testing
knowledge, concepts, and theories that are central to the discipline of biology were highlighted
in the school biology curricula. In order to help its developing Member States, UNESCO, in
collaboration with the International Union of Biological Sciences’ Commission on Biology
Education (IUBS-CBE), initiated the Biology Pilot Project in Africa as part of its Programme
49
and Budget for the biennium 1967-1968. The course content was organised around important
unifying concepts revealed through the process of investigation. New teaching-learning
materials were designed to give students the opportunity to learn by doing. The Project was
complemented by launching a series of publications under the heading of “New Trends In
Biology Teaching.”
Science and Society Axis
In the Seventies, a significant drive for the socio-economic applications of science to a vast
range of changing human needs gathered momentum. With increasing implications of
developments in biological sciences to society, a social approach to biology education was
promoted. This initiated a movement to change the orientation of biology discipline as a
curricular subject to functionality of biology for the majority of students who would not enter
the university. A Preparatory Group Meeting, convened by UNESCO (1975), suggested that
school biology education content, while consistent with the new knowledge, should be relevant
to the real life and work experience of the learner. Thus, to support the national efforts in
adapting biology education to the sociocultural context, UNESCO, in collaboration with IUBS-
CBE, produced biology teaching materials relating to some aspects of human biology, such as
nutrition, human reproduction, and disease. In particular, IUBS-CBE cooperated with UNESCO
in organizing the International Conference on Biology Education in Sweden in 1975 with a view
to determine the major problems and trends in biology education. Based on its findings,
published as Volume IV of “New Trends in Biology Teaching”, a long-term Program of Action
for UNESCO was prepared. It emphasized the change from the closely directed learning of facts
to conceptual understanding, application of acquired knowledge and skills to solve emerging
life’s problems, and linking biology education to socioeconomic needs, productive work, and
development. Accordingly, UNESCO, in cooperation with IUBS-CBE, promoted innovations to
increase the relevance of biology teaching to the various needs and socioeconomic priorities of
its Member States.
Thus, trends such as “science in society” and “science, technology and society” placed biology
teaching in the context of social needs of everyday life. This shifted the focus of biology
education from, “what to know?” to “what to do?” Accordingly, efforts were made to reorient
the biology teacher education and training programmes to suit the changing goals of biology
education. The 1980’s marked the surge of a new wave demanding science and technology to be
an integral component of general education in schools with a view to turn out future citizens as
responsible productive persons in the society. With this, the purpose of biology education and
teacher training shifted towards social action, marking a change from “what to do?” to “what to
become?”
With sociocultural and economic changes occurring as a consequence of scientific and technolo-
gical developments, it became clear that biology education should aim at preparing people to
face new situations and changing social patterns in such a way as to satisfy both the individual
needs of learners and the collective requirements of the society. The Association for Science
Education (ASE) in the United Kingdom (1979) suggested introduction of some aspects of the
world of work into the school science curriculum. In order to improve children’s appreciation of
the world of industry and work, biology education undertook the task to encourage public
awareness of the inter-relationship between science, technology, and society as well as to
stimulate attitudes that would prove conducive for their preparation for the world of work .
Accordingly, IUBS-CBE devoted two of its annual meetings (1978 London, UK and 1979 Kiel,
Germany) to the topic of “Biological Education for Community Development.” This was
followed by the publication, “Teaching Science Out-of-School with Special Reference to
50
Biology” (Meyer and Rao, eds., 1984), based on the proceedings of the IUBS-CBE meeting
held in Singapore in 1981. In addition, the Commission produced a series of documents
published by UNESCO in its Science and Technology Education Document Series (STEDS).
These included: Genetically-Based Biological Technologies (1984); Biological Systems, Energy
Sources and Biology Teaching (1984); Ecology, Ecosystem Management and Biology Teaching
(1984); Agriculture and Biology Teaching (1984); Human Development and Evolution and
Biology Teaching (1985); Field Work in Ecology for Secondary Schools in Tropical Countries
(1988); Repair and Maintenance of Biology Laboratory Equipment (1989); and Teaching
Biotechnology in Schools (1990).
Science and Development
Following the United Nations Conference on Science and Technology for Development
(UNCSTD), 1979, the concern for modernization through science and technology in many
developing countries gathered momentum. Science and technology education became increa-
singly acknowledged as an essential contributor to national development. The International
Congress on Science and Technology Education and National Development (UNESCO, 1981)
bears ample testimony to this effect. The Bangalore Conference, sponsored by ICSU, UNESCO
and ICASE (1985), encouraged science education reform in terms of future human needs and
various quality issues such as ethics, social responsibility, agriculture, industry, technology,
health, food, energy, environment; land, mineral, and water resources; and information transfer.
In line with this, IUBS-CBE developed such documents as “Biological Education and
Community Development” in 1980, containing a collection of reports and papers presented
during its annual meetings of 1978 and 1979 and edited by Kelly and Schaefer; followed by
“Health Education and Biology Teaching” in 1984; “Leisure, Values and Biology Teaching” in
1987; “Biology and Human Welfare: Case Studies in Teaching Applied Biology” in 1988;
“System Thinking in Biology Education” in 1989; and a book on “Basic Human Needs: An
Interdisciplinary and International View” by Schaefer, (1992).
This ushered a shift in emphasis towards social action, extending the slogan, “Science, Tech-
nology and Society (STS)” to “Science, Technology, Society and Personal Development
(STSP).” The personal development aspect, as described in the UNESCO Regional Workshop
on Science and Technology Education at Lower Secondary Level (1991) recognized the
possibilities within the science curriculum to enhance students’ personal skills in logical
thinking, expression, personal management, self-directed learning, co-operation and responsible
action. This approach demanded more attention to teaching children how to learn, manage their
own learning, analyze problems, as well as design and implement solutions.
Science for All
It was recognized that science and technology cannot contribute successfully towards national
development in the absence of a broad base of scientifically literate populace (Yager, 1989;
Bowyer, 1990). Consequently, the goal of an “appropriate science education for all” started
assuming greater prominence. The Science Council of Canada (1984) commissioned a study
entitled “Science for Every Student.” It pointed out that Canada needed science education that
could: develop citizens able to participate fully in the political and social choices facing a
technological society; train those with special interest in science and technology fields for
further study; provide an appropriate preparation for the modern work world; and stimulate
intellectual and moral growth to help students develop into rational autonomous individuals.
Similarly, the “Science for All Americans” Project, launched in 1985, presented what all USA
51
students should know and be able to do in science, mathematics and technology by the time they
graduate from the high school. It also emphasized “understanding of the world through the eyes
of science.” Another effort for “Science for All” can be cited from Asia and the Pacific
(UNESCO, 1983). In this context, science referred to all those aspects of knowledge that result
from the application of the scientific method for investigating real life situations relating to
natural phenomena, the material world, and the immediate environment, including scientific
concepts, processes and attitudes. Its purpose was to enable the whole population to participate
in the responsible use of science and technology for development. The 1990 World Declaration
of Education for All and the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development provided
the driving force for the Project 2000+ Declaration. It urged NGOs, INGOs and governments to
work together to enhance scientific and technological literacy for all within the Project 2000+.
International Commission on Education
A significant event of the 1990s, with consequences for the future of biology education, was the
establishment of the International Commission on Education for the 21st Century by UNESCO
in 1993. Based on a worldwide process of consultation and analysis, the Commission
highlighted the role of education in personal and social development. It also predicted that the
coming century, dominated by globalization, will face some serious tensions between: the
global and the local; the universal and the individual; tradition and modernity; long-term and
short-term considerations; the need for competition and the concern for equality of opportunity;
the extraordinary expansion of knowledge and human capacity to assimilate it; the spiritual and
the material. Irrespective of diversity of cultures and systems of social organization, the
Commission believed that education could serve as one of the means to foster more harmonious
human development to overcome the said tensions and maintain social cohesion. Accordingly,
the Commission proposed and described four pillars as the foundations of education: learning to
know, learning to do, learning to be, and learning to live together. In order to deal with the fast
change of traditional patterns of life and to meet new situations arising in our personal lives and
working conditions, the Commission put greater emphasis on the last pillar, learning to live
together. Furthermore, to keep abreast and live in harmony with the ever changing world, the
Commission supported learning throughout life and pointed out that the only way to satisfy this
is for each individual “to learn how to learn” (UNESCO, 1996).
Future Outlook
The Twentieth Century is often called the century of Physics and Information Technologies.
During our own lifetime we have seen the development of television, computers, satellites and
the Internet. These technologies will continue to affect our lives and our social, cultural,
economic and educational systems. Recently, however, Biological Sciences have been making
tremendous strides. As we stand at the threshold of the 21st Century, we see the beginning of
another scientific revolution that is likely to dominate the new century, sparked, in particular, by
research in biotechnology and the success of the Human Genome Project. In the next couple of
years, people will be able to assess their own genetic susceptibilities to various diseases and
hence be able to make their necessary lifestyle adjustments in a way that has never happened
before. Gene therapy may replace some of the current medical practices for the treatment of
certain forms of disease. Extending already to other species of microbes, plants and animals,
genetic manipulation is expected to take us into a brave new world with greater societal impact
than that of the technological revolution of the 20th Century. Influencing almost all our
activities, from inception to the grave, this revolution will require profound decisions with res-
pect to the ethical, legal, social, cultural, educational, and development issues that are sure to
52
arise, affecting our personal lives and society in ways that we have never experienced before. In
order to be prepared for this, it is imperative that biologists, media, educational planners and
biology educators work together to ensure that future citizens who are in school today and the
public at large are thoroughly educated and made aware of the basic and relevant knowledge of
biology and biotechnology, so as to enable them to make informed decisions to meet any
emerging situation.
Learning Society
The exponential growth of biological knowledge and development of new information and
communication technologies along with the concept of learning throughout life lead us straight
to what we may call the “learning society.” Such a society is based on the acquisition, renewal,
and use of knowledge. The hallmark of this learning society will be the provision of many and
varied opportunities of learning both at school and at work in social, cultural, and economic life
to fulfill one’s potential. This requires two important actions: firstly, to make new knowledge
more accessible in more ways to more people; and secondly, to make more knowledge more
useful to learners. It will also require greater co-operation and new partnerships involving
family, industry, business, voluntary associations, and individuals active in new information and
communication technologies. Many institutions have already started pooling their resources to
create new educational courses using computers and Internet as educational tools for distance
learning. Libraries with their vast holdings can work with educators to provide educational
content to meet the changing needs of school biology curricula. With similar collaboration,
television and satellite can also be exploited for the same purpose.
Humans, Environment, and Sustainable Society
With ever new knowledge and tools of science and technology developing during the last few
decades, humans magnified their role as a dominant force in nature, modifying its physical,
chemical and biological systems at rates and scales larger than ever. The growing human
population has caused, among other things the following major changes: altering and/or
depleting major natural resource systems; altering biogeochemical cycles of carbon, nitrogen,
water, synthetic chemicals, etc.; disturbing ecological balance; transforming land, sea, and air;
depletion of the ozone layer; producing genetically manipulated species and/or populations; loss
of biological diversity; depletion of forests and fisheries; and environmental degradation and
pollution.
These changes are direct or indirect consequences of our thinking, values, and practices in
social, economic, and political affairs. If not checked, many of our current actions will soon put
at risk the future we wish for human society. The need is now evident to ensure a society that is
more sustainable. In fact, while accentuating the global environmental challenges, the United
Nations Conference on Environment and Development, held in Rio in 1992, expressed the
urgency of sustainable development for the world community. To achieve this, it is essential
that we get our thinking right and new values sorted out. The most critical challenges facing
such a society include conservation, restoration, and rational management of world’s natural
resources.
Humans and their socio-economic systems are intimately dependent upon ecological systems, as
these provide a broad range of essential goods and services to humanity. In fact, they form the
life-support systems of all life on the planet. Ecological goods and services provide a key link to
understanding how changes in diversity, climate, stratospheric ozone, as well as land and sea
53
transformations and cycles of water and nitrogen have immediate and long-term consequences
for humanity. Ecosystem services include purification of our air and water; mitigation of floods
and droughts; detoxification and decomposition of waste; generation and renewal of soil and
soil fertility; pollination of crops and natural vegetation; control of agricultural pests; dispersal
of seeds and translocation of nutrients; and maintenance of biodiversity. Hence, biology
education as part of general education, emphasizing these and other relevant topics, offers one
of the most effective means of confronting the challenges of the future. Its goal should be to
make people more knowledgeable, better informed, ethical, responsible, critical, and capable of
continuous learning and exercising rational choice of options based on proper knowledge and
information. In the light of biological revolution, the discipline of biology should be woven with
the social, cultural, economic, and political issues. Thus treated, biology education can easily
help to sensitize people to create a sustainable society. This question was discussed in more
detail in the IUBS-CBE meeting held in Moscow in 1997.
Biology Education Agenda
In the fast changing world of tomorrow, there will be far less stability, and as a consequence,
people may have to change directions in their careers and lifestyles. With the inventions of new
technologies to take up the routine or dangerous tasks, there will also be an increasing amount
of leisure. Of all the ills that presently beset us, none is more pernicious than the fragmentation
of knowledge into arts and science and their corresponding disciplines. Life and its problems do
not fit into such neat compartments. These divisions are only for convenience and do not accord
with the nature of our experience of reality. With recent advances in scientific knowledge and
their applications in solving emerging global problems, the traditional subject boundaries in
science are fast fading, giving greater significance and vitality to bridging sciences of
biochemistry, biophysics, and material sciences. To be realistic, biology education must interact
with other school disciplines, particularly with social sciences and humanities, to be of use to
society in solving its current problems.
Biology education, over the years, has undergone significant changes in its perception. It is
increasingly recognized as an essential background for socio-economic growth and stability. As
such, it should be seen in a broader perspective, i.e. as catering to prepare biologically literate
populace capable of contributing towards sustainable development. It can also help to improve
the quality of human situation through informed decision-making based on judicious
understanding and rational utilisation of biological knowledge and biological technology in such
areas as agricultural production, nutrition, health, population control, natural resource
management, and environmental improvement. The new biology education content must accom-
modate these issues in meeting the challenges of the environmentally and socially sustainable
development. Information and communication technologies have, indeed, created great edu-
cational possibilities, but to succeed, political will, proper planning and concerted actions are
equally necessary.
References
ASE. (1979). Alternatives for science education: A consultative document. ASE, Hatfield.
Bowyer, J. (1990). Scientific and technological literacy for education for change: A special
study for the “World conference on education for all”, 5-9 March 1990. Jometian, Thailand.
UNESCO, Paris.
ICSU-CTS, UNESCO, and ICASE. (1985). Science and technology education and future human
needs: Bangalore Conference, Bangalore, India.
54
Kelly, P. J. and Schaefer, G. (1980). Biological education and community development. Taylor
and Francis, London. 1980.
Meyer, G. Rex and Rao, A. N. (Eds.). (1984). Teaching science out- of- school with special
reference to biology, Singapore and Sydney. IUBS-CBE and Asian Network for Biological
Sciences, 1984.
Science Council of Canada. (1984). Report 36: Science for every student. Canadian
Government Printing Center, Ottawa, Ontario.
Schaefer, G. (Ed.). (1992). Basic human needs: An interdisciplinary and international view.
Peter Lang Publications, Berlin/Bern/New York. 1992.
UNCSTD. (1979). United Nations conference on science and technology for development.
Vienna, Austria.
UNESCO. (1975). Science in basic functional education: Philosophy, approaches, methods and
materials. Report of the preparatory working group meeting. Republic of Korea. UNESCO
regional office for education in Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok.
UNESCO. (1981). International congress on science and technology education and national
development: Report. UNESCO, Paris.
UNESCO. (1983). Science for all: Report of a regional meeting, September 1983. Bangkok.
UNESCO regional office for education in Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok.
UNESCO. (1991). Science for all and quality of life. Report of the regional workshop on
science and technology education at lower secondary level, March 1990. Kathmandu. UNESCO
principal regional office for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok.
UNESCO. (1996). Learning: The treasure within. Report to UNESCO of the international
commission on education for the twenty-first century. UNESCO, Paris.
Yager, R. (1989). Science/ technology/ society: A new effect for providing appropriate science
for all. NSTA position paper on STS. NSTA task force. Washington DC.
55
International Association of Sexual Plant Reproduction Research

(IASPRR) Conference
Banff , Alberta, Canada, April 1-5, 2000
The 16th international congress on sexual plant reproduction was held at The Banff Centre in
Banff, Alberta, Canada April 1-5, 2000. The congress was organized by David Cass (University
of Alberta, Alberta, Canada), Art Davis and Vipen Sawhney (University of Saskatchewan,
Saskatchewan, Canada), and Yvonne Dixon (The Banff Centre, Alberta, Canada). There were
about 160 delegates from 23 countries. The congress consisted of 2 special lectures, 6 symposia
(38 individual talks) over 4 days, and nearly 90 poster presentations. One of the special lectures
was the keynote address entitled "Sexual Plant Reproduction: past, present, and future," given
by Joseph Mascarenhas (State University of New York at Albany, U.S.A.). The other special
lecture, "Conifer reproduction: diversity in a small but ancient group," was given by John
Owens (University of Victoria, Canada). Symposium topics were: experimental embryogenesis;
flowering and flower development; environmental stress and reproduction; apomixis; pollen
tube growth; male sterility and hybrid seed production. In addition to symposium talks and
special lectures, there were approximately 90 poster presentations, which delegates could view
at their convenience. A general meeting of the IASPRR was held after the apomixis symposium
on Monday, April 3. A banquet was held in the evening of Tuesday, April 4 at the conclusion
of which special recognition was given to Ms. Yvonne Dixon, Conference Services Manager of
The Banff Centre, for her inspired assistance in putting this conference together, and to Dr.
Michiel Willemse, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands, for his lifetime
contributions to the IASPRR. At the closing ceremonies on Wednesday, April 5, awards were
made to Kristen A. Lennon, University of California, Riverside, California, U.S.A., for her
poster on pollen tube structure of Arabidopsis, to Jeffrey D. Pylatiuk, University of
Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada for his poster on hybrid seed production in Brassica napus,
and to M. Sofia Cordeiro, University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal, for her symposium talk on
chloride and potassium fluxes during pollen tube growth in Lilium. The conference ended with
lunch on Wednesday, April 5.
Our conference was an interesting blend of both basic and applied science. The basic parts
included new information on the genetics of floral development, electrophysiology of pollen
tube growth, stylar extracellular matrix structure as it relates to pollen tube growth, genes
controlling apomixis, experiments with living flowering plant embryos, the effects of
environmental stress on plant reproduction, and male sterility and hybrid seed production.
Many of these topics have important applications to crop production. For example, the group
from Hamburg, Germany has developed a method for introducing a novel gene into sperm cells
of maize. Zygotes resulting from in vitro fusion of eggs with transgenic sperms express the
novel gene. This result is important to researchers interested in developing different approaches
for the introduction of new genetic material into plants at very early stages. Researchers at
Pioneer Hi-Bred have developed a line of maize which is male sterile unless the tassels are
sprayed with biotin. Their result means that male fertility can be "switched on" when
pollination is required. If the biotin spray is not used, the plants remain male sterile.
Sponsors for IASPRR 2000 were: Ag-West Biotech, Inc., Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada; Aventis
CropScience, Brussels, Belgium and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada; Novartis, Basel, Switzerland:
Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc., Johnston, Iowa, U.S.A.; Plant Biotechnology Institute, Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan, Canada; University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; University of Saskatchewan,
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada; Zeneca Agrochemicals Ltd., Jealott’s Hill, U.K. The organizers of
IASPRR 2000 wish to express their gratitude for the generous support received from these sponsors.
56
Biology International N° 39 (July, 2000))
PUBLICATIONS REVIEW
ALTERNATIVE Sustainable Development. Focusing on
REPRODUCTION STRATEGIES how the promises of biotechnology can be
Edited by Motonori Hoshi & Midori realized for the benefit of the world’s
Matsumoto, 2000. Published in The Journal of poor, the environment, and the safe
Reproduction and Development (Vol. 46, management of biotechnology products
Supplement March, 2000, (88 pages). and processes, this volume summarizes
the wide-ranging, stimulating and
This Supplement Issue is a collection of provocative presentations and discussions
the extended abstracts of the presentations that took place during the meeting.
at the IUBS-TAIB Symposium on
“Alternative Reproductive Strategies.” GLOBAL CHANGE STUDIES
The meeting was held on 25-28 Nov., Scientific Results From ISRO
1999, in Hayama, Japan to discuss the Geosphere Biosphere Programme
problem of alternative strategies with a Edited by BH Subbaraya, DP Rao, PS Desai,
very broad view from theoretical to B Manikiman , P Rajaratnam. Send your order
experimental, from molecular biology to to: San Subscription Agency, 104, Sector 28,
natural history, and from bacteria to Faridabad -121 008 (Haryana-India) Tel:
mammals. 5278504 E.mail: sansub@ndf.vsnl.net.in
BALANCED THINKING The book Global Change Studies contains

An Educational Perspective for about 20 scientific articles based on actual
2000+ on the Basis of a Cross- work done and results obtained by ISRO-
cultural German/Japanese Study GBP scientists during the period 1994 to
By Gerhard Schaefer and Ryoei Yoshioka. 1997. The papers address a wide range of
Published by Peter Lang GMBH, topics from atmospheric chemistry and
Frankfurt/M., Germany, 2000, (206 pages) radiation (trace gases and aerosols)
atmospheric/climate modelling, boundary
This book, initiated by a comparative layer research, agriculture and forestry
empirical study on ways of thinking of biodiversity and ecosystem studies,
populations of German and Japanese oceanography and paleoclimate studies.
students, picks up on the old question of
the decision-making process between LIMNOLOGY IN DEVELOPING
contradicting needs. Stimulated by striking COUNTRIES
differences found in the way the two Edited by Robert G. Wetzel and Brij Gopal,
populations dealt with the contradiction Published by SIL and International Scientific
problem, the study addresses the general Publications New Delhi, India, 1999 (330
problem of contradiction against the pages)
background of a “polarity approach” to Freshwater resources are becoming more
life. crucial than ever for the sustenance of life
on the earth. The ever increasing human
BIOTECHNOLOGY AND demands for water and rapid deterioration
BIOSAFETY of water quality threaten freshwater
Edited by Ismail Serageldin and Wanda biodiversity. Understanding of the
Collins. Published by the IBRD/World Bank, functioning of inland water ecosystems
1999, (214 pages). and their interactions with their respective
drainage basins is critical to their
These are the proceedings of the meeting sustainable management. The principal
on “Biotechnology and Biosafety,” an aim of the “Limnology in Developing
associated event of the fifth annual World Countries” series, which is published by
Bank Conference on Environmentally the International Association for
57
Theoretical and Applied Limnology (SIL), With the world human population
is to review the status of conservation and expected to reach upwards of 9 billion by
management of inland water resources, 2050, two key questions arise: How can
and to encourage limnological research the transition to a stabilizing population
and training in developing countries. This also be a transition to sustainability ? And
2nd volume of the series includes reviews how can science and technology help
of limnological research and training for ensure that human needs are met while the
five countries: Costa Rica, Uruguay, planet’s environment is nurtured and
Ethiopia, Indonesia and Morocco. Reviews restored ?
for three of the largest developing
countries, Brazil, China and India, are in Examining these questions, this book
advanced stages of preparation. draws strategic connections between
scientific research, technological
MOUNTAIN BIODIVERSITY, development, and societies’ efforts to
LAND USE DYNAMICS, AND achieve environmentally sustainable
TRADITIONAL ECOLOGICAL improvements in human well-being.
KNOWLEDGE Arguing that societies should approach
Edited P.S. Ramakrishnan, U.M. sustainable development not as a
Chandrashekara, C. Elouard, C.Z. Guilmoto, destination but as an on-going, adaptive
R.K. Maikhuri, K.S. Rao, S. Sankar & K.G. learning process, the book proposes a
Saxena. Published by UNESCO MAB and strategy for using scientific and technical
Oxford & IBH Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd., New knowledge to inform future action in the
Delhi, India, 2000 (353 pages). areas of fertility reduction, urban systems,
agricultural production, energy and
This book presents the results of a 3-year materials use, ecosystem restoration and
research initiative funded by UNESCO biodiversity conservation, and suggests an
and the MacArthur Foundation and approach for building a new research
comprising three case studies in India, agenda for sustainability science.
namely: the Kodagu District , Karnataka
State; the Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary in THE VENICE LAGOON
the Kerala State; and the buffer zone of ECOSYSTEM
the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, in the Inputs and Interactions Between
Uttar Pradesh. This comparative study Land and Sea
programme looked at the dynamics Edited by P. Lasserre & A. Marzollo, 2000.
involved in natural resource management, Published by UNESCO MAB & The
both in space and time, linking them Parthenon Publishing Group (508 pages).
wherever appropriate with traditional
ecological knowledge. The scientific results of the Venice Lagoon
Ecosystem Project, which are reported in
A whole gamut of interconnections this volume, represent a distinctive
ranging from sub-specific, species, contribution to the understanding of one of
ecosystem, leading up to landscape levels the most renowned coastal lagoon
were used to arrive at conclusions relevant ecosystems, as well as to decisions on the
to natural resource management with future development of Venice and its
concern for the livelihood/development of lagoon. The approaches and insights
the communities and regions under described in the book will also be of
consideration. interest to scientists working on coastal
lagoon ecosystems in other parts of the
OUR COMMON JOURNEY world.
A Transition Toward Sustainability
By the Board on Sustainable Development,
Policy Division, National Research Council.
Published by National Academy Press, 1999,
(363 pages).
58
CALENDAR OF MEETINGS
IUBS – sponsored meetings are indicated in bold-type face
Additional information may be obtained from addresses in ( ) parentheses
E-mail: iubs@paris7.jussieu.fr http://www.iubs.org)

2000
MOLECULAR BIOLOGY
BIOTECHNOLOGY
International Conference on Cell Surface
11th Int’l Biotechnology Symposium
Aminopeptidases
and Exhibition 15-18 August, Nagoya, Japan
3-8 Sept., ICC, Berlin, Germany (Contact: Kazuhiko Ino, Department of Obstetrics and
(DECHEMA e.V., c/o 11th IBS, Gynaecology, Nagoya University School of Medicine,
Theodor-Heuss-Allee 25, 65 Tsurumai-cho, Showa-ku, Nagoya, 446-8550, Japan
D-60486 Frankfurt a. Main, Germany Ph: +81 52 744 2261,
Fax: +49 (0)69 756 41 76 E-mail: info@dechema.de Fax: +81 52 744 2268
http://www.dechema.de/biotechnology2000) E-mail: smizu@tsuru.med.nagoya-u.ac.jp)
Int’l Marine Biotechnolgy Conference OCEANOGRAPHY

(IMBC 2000) SCOR 25th General Meeting &
29 Sept.-5 Oct., Townsville, Australia Symposium “Nutrient Over-enrichment in
(Contact: Australian Institute of Marine Science,
P.O. Box 216, Aitkenvale, QLD 4814 Australia. Coastal Waters: Global Patterns of Cause
Ph: +61 (0)7 4781 6219 Fx: +61 (0)7 4781 5822 and Effect”
E-mail: imbc_2000@aims.gov.au 10-13 October, Washington, D.C., USA
http://www.aims.gov.au/imbc-2000) (Contact: Elizabeth Gross, SCOR Secretariat, Dept. of
Earth and Planetary Sciences, The Johns Hopkins
GENERAL BIOLOGY University, Baltimore, MD 21218 USA
Ph: +1 410 516 4070
Seminar Biology 2000 –on the occasion of Fax +1 410 516 4019
400 Years of the Birth of Modern Science E-mail: scor@jhu.edu)
Galileo-Galilei
23-28 Oct., Bogotá D.C. Colombia
(Contact: Hugo Hoenigsberg, Dept. of Genetics and PLANT PROTECTION
Evolution, University Manuela Beltrán, Avenida 7th Arab Congress of Plant Protection
Circunvalar # 60-00, Bogotá, D.C. Colombia 22-26 Oct., Amman, Jordan
Ph: +57 1 546-0625, -0628 (Contact: Dr. Walid Abu-Gharbieh, Faculty of
Fax: +57 1 546 0629 Argriculture, Univ. of Jordan, Amman - 11942, Jordan
E-mail: hoenisbe@academica.umb.edu.co) Fax: +962 6 5355577
E-mail: sacpp@ju.edu.jo)
GENETICS
Ressources Génétiques: Connaissances et BCPC Conference –
Gestion – 3° colloque national Pests and Diseases 2000
9-11 Oct., Toulouse, France 13-16 Nov., Brighton, England
(Contact: BRG, 16 rue Claude Bernard, 75231 Paris (Contact: BCPC Conference Secretariat,
cedex 05 France. Fax: +33 (0)1 44 08 72 63 5 Maidstone Bldg Mews, Bankside,
E-mail: Brg@inapg.inra.fr) London SE1 1GN, England
Fax: +44 (0)20 7940 5577
E-mail: conference@bcpc.org)
IUBS
IUBS 27th General Assembly &
Int’l Conference “Biological Sciences: ZOOLOGY
Challenges for the 21st Century” The New (XVIII) Int’l Congress of
8-12 November, Naples, Italy Zoology
(Contact: Dr. Talal Younès, IUBS, 51 Bd Montmorency, 28 Aug.-2 Sept., Athens, Greece
75016 Paris. Ph: +33 (0)1 45 25 00 09 (Contact: Dr. R. Polymeni, Hellenic Zoological Society,
Fax: +33 (0)1 45 25 20 29 P.O. Box 3249 K.T. , 102 10 Athens, Greece)
59
2001 Resistance 2001 – Meeting the Challenge
23-26 Sept., Harpenden, Herts., England
(Contact: IACR-Rothamsted, Harpenden,
GENERAL BIOLOGY Herts. AL5 2JQ, UK. Ph: +44 (0)1582 763113
st Fax: +44 (0)1582 760981
1 Int’l Conference on Biosystem Science
E-mail: res.2001@bbsrc.ac.uk
& Engineering ICBSE & http://www.iacr.bbsrc.ac.uk/tmeeting.html)
Int’l Conference on Endocrinology &
Molecular Morphogenesis &
Int’l Conference on Transgenic Animals
and Bio-Logic Engineering
21-27 Oct., Beijing, China
2002
(Contact: Bangzhe J. Zeng, An der Hohnhorst 11,
31535 Neustadt a. Rbge., Germany HORTICULTURAL SCIENCE
E-mail: Bangzhe@hotmail.com
http://www.genbrain.net) XXVI Int’l Horticultural Congress
August, Toronto, Canada
(Contact: Dr. J. Van Assche, K. Mercierlaan 92,
ENDOCRINOLOGY 3001 Leuven, Belgium
th
14 Int’l Congress of Comparative Ph: +32 (0)1 622 9427, Fax: +32 (0)1 622 9450
E-mail: info@ishs.org)
Endocrinolgy
26-30 May, Sorrento, Italy
(Contact: Studio Congressi Cicala de Pertis, ORNITHOLOGY
Via S. Anna dei Lombrdi, 38 rd
23 Int’l Ornithological Congress
80134 Napoli, Italy 11-17 Aug., Beijing, China
E-mail : studiocongressi@napoli.com
(Contact: Prof. Xu Weishu, 1-1-302 Beijing Sci. and
http://www.napoli.com/studiocongressi)
Tech. Commission Apt., Lingnan Rd. Beijing 100037,
P.R. China
LAKE BIODIVERSITY Ph/Fax: +86 (0)10 6846 5605
ILEC Conference – 9th International E-mail: s-g@ioc.org.cn)
Conference on the Conservation and

Management of Lakes (Biwako 2001) PARASITOLOGY
11-16 Nov., Oroshimo, Kusatsu, Shiga, Japan Xth Int’l Congress of Parasitology
(Contact: Secretariat of Biwako 2001, August, Vancouver, Canada
Shiga Prefectural Government, 4-1-1 Kyomachi, (Contact: Prof. M. Zia Alkan, Dept. of Parasitology,
Otsu, Shiga, 520-8577, Japan Medical Faculty of Ege Univ., Bornova-Izmir 35100,
Ph: +81 77 528 3465, Fax: +81 77 528 4849 Turkey. Fax: +90 (0)232 388 134
E-mail: lake2001@pref.shiga.jp E-mail: alkan@med.ege.edu.tr)
http://www.pref.shiga.jp/lake2001)
PATHOPHYSIOLOGY
MEDICINAL & AROMATIC PLANTS th
4 Int’l Congress of Pathophysiology
(WOCMAP 2001) 29 June-5 July, Budapest, Hungary
8-10 July, Budapest, Hungary (Contact: Prof. Lajos G. Szollar, Institute of
(Contact: Dr. Oszkár Köck, Nat’l. Inst. for Agricultural Pathophysiology, Semmelweiss University Medical
Quality Control, P.O. Box 30, 93. School, Budapest, P.O.B. 370, H-1445 Hungary)
H-1525 Budapest, Hungary. Ph: +36 1 2123 127
Fax: +36 1 2122 673 E-mail: map.congr@ommi.hu)
PLANT PROTECTION
Seed Treatment – Challenges and
Opportunities
26-27 Feb., Wishaw, North Warwickshire, England
(Contact: British Crop Protection Enterprises
49 Downing Street, Farnham, Surrey GU9 7PH, UK
Ph: +44 (0)1252 733 072, Fax: +44 (0)1252 727 194
E-mail: md@bcpc.org http://www.bcpc.org
60
BIOLOGY
INTERNATIONAL
The News Magazine of the
International Union of Biological Sciences
Editorial Board
Jean-Claude MOUNOLOU, Centre de Génétique Moléculaire, CNRS, Avenue de la Terrasse,
91198 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France (Chairman). E-mail: mounolou@mercure.cgm.cnrs-gif.fr
Marvalee H. WAKE, Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-

3140, USA. E-mail: mhwake@socrates.berkeley.edu
Peter WHITTAKER, Biology Department, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Co. Kildare,
Ireland, E-mail: peter.whittaker@may.ie
Karen WILSON, Royal Botanical Gardens, Mrs. Macquaries Road, Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia. E-
mail: karen@rbgsyd.gov.au
Sergei VASSETSKY, Koltsov Institute of Developmental Biology, 26 Vavilov Street, Russian

Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 117334, Russia. E-mail: sgvas@ibrran.msk.su
Talal YOUNÈS, IUBS Secretariat, 51 Boulevard Montmorency, 75016 Paris, France

(Managing Editor). E-mail: ty002@dial.oleane.com
Vivien REUTER, IUBS Secretariat, 51 Boulevard Montmorency, 75016 Paris, France (Assistant
Managing Editor). E-mail: iubs@paris7.jussieu.fr
Three regular issues of Biology International will be published in 2000. Free

copies are offered to Ordinary and Scientific Members of the Union. The annual
subscription rate for individuals is 40 US Dollars.
Signed articles express the opinion of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the
opinion of the Editor of Biology International. Prospective authors should send an
outline of the proposed article to the Editor, with a letter explaining why the
subject might be of interest to readers.
(c) 2000 International Union of Biological Sciences

ISSN 02532069
Biology International
the News Magazine of the
INTERNATIONAL UNION OF
BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
President : J.-C. Mounolou (France) Past-President : D. L. Hawksworth (U.K.)
Vice-Presidents : C.-H. Chou (Taiwan) Secretary General : M. H. Wake (U.S.A.)
J. Galizia-Tundisi (Brazil) Treasurer : O. O. Hänninen (Finland)
Executive Director : Talal YOUNÈS
IUBS SECRETARIAT
51, Boulevard Montmorency, 75016 Paris, France.
Tel: 33 (0)1 45.25.00.09 - Telefax: 33 (0)1 45.25.20.29
Email: iubs@paris7.jussieu.fr.
http://www.iubs.org
The International Union of Biological Sciences is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation,

established in 1919. Its objectives are to promote the study of biological sciences, to initiate,
facilitate, and co-ordinate research and other scientific activities that require international
cooperation, to ensure the discussion and dissemination of the results of cooperative research, to
promote the organisation of international conferences and to assist in the publication of their
reports.
The membership of the IUBS presently consists of 42 Ordinary Members, adhering through
Academies of Science, National Research Councils, national science associations or similar
organisations, and 80 Scientific Members, all of which are international scientific associations,
societies or commissions in the various biological disciplines.
National Adhering Organisations

ARGENTINA- Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones MEXICO- Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia
Cientificas y Técnicas MONACO- Centre Scientifique de Monaco
AUSTRALIA- Australian Academy of Science NETHERLANDS- Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie
AUSTRIA- Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften van Wetenschappen
BELGIUM- Royal Academy of Science, Letters & Arts NEW ZEALAND- The Royal Society of New Zealand
BRAZIL- Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento NORWAY- Det Norske Videnskaps Academi
Cientifico e Tecnologico PHILIPPINES- National Research Council of the
BULGARIA- Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Philippines
CHILE- Sociedad de Biologia de Chile POLAND- Polish Academy of Sciences
CHINA- Association for Science and Technology, Beijing ROMANIA- Romanian Academy of Sciences
CHINA- Academia Sinica, Taipei RUSSIA- Russian Academy of Sciences
CUBA- Academia de Ciencias SAUDI ARABIA- King Abdul Aziz City for Science &
CZECH Republic- Czech Academy of Sciences Technology
DENMARK- Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes SLOVAK Republic- Slovak Academy of Sciences
Selskab SOUTH AFRICA- Foundation for Research
EGYPT- Academy of Scientific Research and Technology Development
FINLAND- Delegation of Finnish Academies of Sciences SPAIN- Comision Interministerial de Ciencia y
& Letters Tecnologia Tecnologia
FRANCE- Académie des Sciences SWEDEN- Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien
GERMANY- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft SWITZERLAND- Swiss Academy of Sciences
HUNGARY- Hungarian Academy of Sciences TUNISIA- Association Tunisienne des Sciences
INDIA- Indian National Science Academy Biologiques
IRELAND- Royal Irish Academy UNITED KINGDOM- The Royal Society
ISRAEL- Academy of Sciences and Humanities U.S.A.- National Academy of Sciences- National
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Biology International

Editorial by Talal Younès 1

Biological Education: Challenges of the 21st Century

• The Address of UNESCO

IUBS Members Congresses

The International Symposium "BioEd 2000: The Challenges of Biological Education

The reviews papers focused on new biological knowledge in such domains as

relevant settings as classrooms, laboratories or exhibition halls. And between the

The address of Professor Koïchiro Matsuura, Director General of UNESCO, outlines

The Address of UNESCO

Monsieur le Président de BioEd 2000,

UNESCO is fully aware of its great responsibilities in playing an effective role in

Why is this so important?

Ladies and Gentlemen,

This is essential, as so many issues of major importance today - concerning human

As you know, UNESCO is actively engaged in encouraging broad debate on bioethical

Ladies and Gentlemen,

· producing guidelines for the development of education in such domains as

· assisting Member States in the development of curricula, teacher training

· working in close collaboration and partnership with the science education

Generally speaking, education represents the domain through which humankind

In a report entitled "Learning - the Treasure Within," presented in 1996 to UNESCO,

New biological knowledge

At the micro-level, the development and use of sophisticated molecular biology

The biological sciences have seen the emergence of important interdisciplinary

Facing these challenges, research, training and education in science, particularly

New Educational Concepts and Approaches

sessions with hundreds of 'young' scientists (students at secondary schools) presenting

Another important consequence of adopting the re-constructivist approach consists in its

New Tools for Education

New Actors and Partners

history museums, and science centers. In addition, a large number of organizations,

Prospects and Conclusions

Integrative Biology as a Framework for

I introduce the concept of “integrative biology” and education by paraphrasing key

What is “integrative biology?” Traditionally, biologists are trained, and departments

In the context of a synthetic approach to problems, some investigators have referred to

I present as an exemplar a research- and education-based example of integrative biology

illustrated in a recent article in Science written by six of my colleagues who study

1) the meeting of scientists with diverse expertise, but an interest in complex

The process can be initiated by the development of new, non-traditional courses. My

Biology, Education and Ethics

Other potential forms of therapeutic utilisation would involve re-programming of

knowledge has become fundamental to political/social responsibility. Without

Biological education and mediation

At the university, teaching still adheres to historical subdivisions. Cell biology,

Out-of-school, we should take advantage of the current controversies surrounding

Biosciences and Bioeducation in

Most administrative decision-makers have a confused perception that there is some

identity, place in these cycles, and perception of environmental and social

Management of Biological Resources

Let us consider the example of an administrator responsible for the management of

Subsidies Open Access/

Interest Patents & Quotas

Property Market Selectivity

Figure 1: The formal environment of biological management

Biological Knowledge Requirements

Decision- Selection, Drift

Figure 2: Management of biological resources

When considering the driving forces of biological dynamics, biologists emphasise