Country Profile

Colombia

SYNBIO MAP

SynBio Map is a part of the Synthetic Biology Project, founded in 2009. It is a project that tracks the growth of biological field worldwide. This map helps to find places where universities, research institutes, military and governmental laboratories are expanding their activities in the field. The map is based in official websites, scientific literature and scientific articles. However, the activity in the synthetic biology field expands at great speed, in a way that the map is always in progress.

In the latest version of 2014’s SynBio Map in the place where Colombia is located no activity was found, even though the country has been developing many researches in this field. Because of the many updates that happen throughout the years in the project, it’s expected that a world map could be a part of the program someday, showing what’s new and which centers are developing researches for the development of synthetic biology. With effort is expected that these data update, can happen in a more effective way, in order to promote a real integration with SynBio Map.

PARTICIPATION IN THE iGEM COMPETITION

Since the start of the competition in 2006, Colombia has had some teams participating and earning their space on the competition. However, the first medal-bronze-came with the Colombia-Israel. In 2008 and 2009 there was a participation from the teams IPOC1-Colombia and IPOC2-Colombia.The team has participated in the competition in the years of 2011, 2012 and 2013. They won prizes for two years including a gold medal. Since then, the group is in their fourth participation in a row, working on iGEM projects, they will participate in 2014, when the competition completes its 10^th anniversary.

BIOTECHNOLOGY INDUSTRY AND FUNDS

In the country, Conciencias is the governmental institution in charge of organizing public policies for scientific awareness, technology and innovation (CTI) in Colombia to promote a knowledge production, CTI capacitating and promote the circulation and the use of each for the development and well-being of Colombians.

The country has a strong tradition and a basic research infrastructure especially in the fields of agriculture and human health. The research in biotechnology gave a big push when the National Biotechnology (Program Nacional de Biotecnologia - PNB) was created in 1991, through this program a monitoring system has been implemented to help guide, monitor and finance the formation for human resources and investigation projects related to this new technology. This way, Colombia has nowadays 138 biotechnology research groups, most of them associated with universities (Pena 2008).

Since PNB was founded, Colciencias has been working in developing policies and defining action plans, in a way to adapt to biotechnology’s fast development global scale, meeting the country’s needs and enabling the opportunities that this technology brings to Colombia (Colciencias).

CorpoGen is a private non-profit organization that has established itself as a center of excellence in scientific research and technological development in Colombia. The Corporation meets with a multidisciplinary group who shares infrastructure and resources to integrate three causes: scientific research, formation of human resources and the development and sale of biotechnological services and products (CorpoGen).

The Biotechnology field has the government projects as its main financing source; it allocates money to science, technology and education. Other resources come from private companies, production, credit and venture capital.

The Biotechnology field will try to establish Colombia as a world class industry within the next 8-10 years (Pena 2008), supporting biotechnological initiates in different regional with ongoing projects Besides, has been supported strengthening and the creation of research and development involving different areas in the value chain of biotechnology in various sectors: agribusiness (agriculture, livestock and food industry); pharmaceutical and health; cosmetics and toiletries; environment and energy; plastics and rubber; textiles and leather goods; metallurgical and auto parts; industrial and medical gases; printing industry; among others, contribute to the development of the biotechnology industry.

In the next 8-10 years, the biotechnology industry should be established as an engine of development for the country from the generation and expansion of knowledge and the strengthening of its economic and social impacts, through the appropriate use of scientific and technological resources available. Also, be one of the most competitive areas for Colombia and those who make major contributions to technological development, improving quality of life, job creation and environmental preservation (Pena, 2008).

REGULATIONS FOR SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY

In the regulation of biotechnology, the government issued the document CONPES 3697 of 14 June 2011 on the commercial development of policies based on sustainable use of biodiversity biotechnology. Among other objectives, this document aims to strengthen the institutional capacity for the commercial development of biotechnology, the promotion of trade, sustainable and productive use of biological and genetic resources and their derivatives, the creation of financial instruments to strengthen the companies based biotechnology, adapt and review related to access to genetic resources and their derivatives and adjust regulatory framework and regulations update on production and marketing of biotech drugs and herbal products (Hurtado 2012). From the capacity needs and infrastructure for research in the area of genetic engineering in the country, the importance for Colombia told with updates satisfactory to develop genomic studies and enable advances in the study of biodiversity was established. To provide this perspective, the National System of Science, Technology and Innovation signed a special cooperation between -Colciencias-, Roche and the University of Antioquia for the functioning of the National Center for Genome Sequencing (CNSG) who provide services independently to universities, research centers and companies that need. However, there is a problem related to scientific research within the legal framework in Colombia. The problem consists of several drawbacks for contracts that grant legal access to genetic resources and biological collections in the country and the long waiting time for obtaining research and collecting permits to investigate the biodiversity itself.

RESEARCH, PEOPLE AND ORGANIZATION

The statistical analysis to measure the status of biotechnology in developing countries is the responsibility of the OAS (Organization of American States). In December 2004, a study was conducted in Bogotá, under the coordination of the OST (Organization for Economic Cooperation Development). From the perspective of scientific and technological capacity, measured in units of research, research projects and modern biotechnology, Colombia has 184 research units and 1,007 researchers linked to 678 projects. On the production of these groups in relation to the number of patent applications Colombia has 12 groups and centers in Colombia 54% work in agricultural biotechnology. Development programs of biotechnology may be conducted by ministries, research centers and bodies promoting science and technology, with its own resources or multilateral funding agencies. (Castanõ 2013).

Starting from a survey made by Colombia_uniandes team, where 40 people were interviewed and asked questions on their knowledge of synthetic biology, and as expected ,according to the data collected by the team (seen on graph 1 ),most people were not aware of the development in this field. Thus, raising data about the perception of synthetic biology and biotechnology should be done in a way that the population could feel as a part of the development reached in the researches.

Rapid advances in biotechnology have raised a strong political reaction in some countries. A properly informed public is an essential condition for the advance in the area is not undermined because of a political reaction (Camargo 2005).

Fig. 1 - Survey made Colombia_uniandes team with the population regarding their knowledge on synthetic biology.

EVENTS RELATED TO SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY

Entering the international arena is being held in order to draw early on entrepreneurs and specialized investors. That's why the Colombian government is creating new instruments to support bioentrepreneurs and to finance research projects and more ambitious development. So far, has been great success: Bogotá has been chosen for the first edition of the international fair BIOLATAM, which met in December 2013, companies and investors around the world who are already eyeing Colombia (Garmendia, 2014). The city has also been the headquarters of Latin America iGEM Jamboree in 2012 where several teams took part providing to the academic community the ability to share knowledge about genetic engineering and the development of the iGEM competition.