ments, ESAP will soon have to decide whether IPRs or Open Source Biological Software or a flexible combination of the two will help more effective knowledge utilization among peasants. Given that open source software can be effective in incremental innovations and may not be useful for radical innovations (Bonardi and Warin, 2007), it may be ideal for developing countries with large peasant populations and ru­ral non-farm employment demands to invest in open source software. The question that will be asked increasingly will be about their potential for generating local ownership and appropriate institutional reform in public and private R&D in individual countries (Connett-Porceddu, 2006).
     The institutions or rules/norms that govern the public sector agricultural research organizations and their ways of generating and evaluating technologies is increasingly receiv­ing attention in the ESAP region (Raina, 2003b; Hall, 2005; World Bank, 2006c; Raina and Sulaiman, 2007b). Formal AKST organizations in the region will be increasingly called upon by Governments and the public to prove their efficacy in improved livelihoods and incomes for the rural poor, pov­erty reduction, overall quantity and quality of food systems and a sustainable environment with significant reductions in agricultural pollution. Increasingly emerging challenges will also demand institutional reform within the agricultural R&D organizations; these challenges may be pest or disease outbreaks (avian flu, anthrax, etc.), climate change impacts, water scarcity, trade or other market standards, energy or fuel crises in rural areas, food processing and retail demands. New or modified ways of working and institutional changes will be necessary to achieve these goals.

4.2.6.3   Biotechnology, transgenic crops and pesticides
Much as the chemical and mechanical inputs into agriculture have moved from household level and village artisan based sources to public and private funded sources of knowledge and artifacts, the biological components will also move to industrial/manufactured goods markets and private sourc­es of knowledge and product generation (Rieuvenkamp, 2003). Asian biotechnology investments are predominantly in public sector organizations, despite the fact that private research in the biosciences and biotechnology has grown rapidly over the past two decades. Most Asian bioscience capacities are therefore in a "public-sector bind" with
•   A precedence and affiliation towards conducting re­search almost as an end in itself without worrying about application, commercialization or utilization;
•   Significant compartmentalization of R&D into differ­ent sectors (Ministries); and
•   Little  capacity  for   biotechnology  commercialization and the partnerships necessary for commercialization (Chaturvedi, 2002; Peczon and Manalo, 2004; Wong et al., 2004; Hidayat, 2006; La Vina and Caleda, 2006).

A common feature that marks the public sector R&D in the biosciences is inertia and resistance to change. This iner­tia has more to do with internal institutional rigidities than with lack of technological capabilities or an increase in con­cern about environmental safety as evidence by the fact that public research organizations in Asia have access to several biotechnology results that have potential applications in so-

ciety. Though there are only a few notable public sector en­terprises in biotechnology, it is likely that increasing institu­tional reform will enable venture capital led biotechnology enterprises to emerge from public R&D and there will be increasing collaboration between public-private R&D and private industry.
     Some countries like Japan, Singapore, China, India and Malaysia are home to fast growing and thriving biotechnol­ogy enterprises—national biotechnology strategies in each of these countries reveal ways to continue this expansion. Some countries like South Korea have taken a pro-active ap­proach to development of biotechnology and transgenics for application in various sectors. The Korea BioVision 2010 is a plan put forth by the Ministry of Commerce Industry and Energy (MOCIE) highlighting the role of transgenics in several fields (Feddema, 2003). It is projected that follow­ing this strategy the country will be seventh in the world of biotechnology.
     While China has an edge in commercializing agricul­tural biotechnology and some specialized areas like stem cell research, India has established its advantages in industrial biotechnology, animal/veterinary health products and diag­nostics. The growth of these specific sectors has also been conditioned by the domestic policies enabling their growth, e.g., the Indian pharmaceutical industry. Increasingly, there is pressure on these enterprises to shift their attention from catering to the global MNCs/global market in order to focus on domestic development needs (Frew et al., 2007).
     Asia will continue to be the "new promised land" for the large diversified MNCs in the pharmaceutical sector (Ekchart et al., 2005). Besides cost savings due to availabil­ity of cheap labor, industry now seeks quality manpower to work in the biotechnology sector. In the enterprise domain, the most globally integrated and tantalizing bio-innovation success in Asia is that of Singapore. The Government of Sin­gapore, through its Economic Development Board (a statu­tory board under the Ministry of Finance), spearheaded the development of biotech enterprises in the country (Tsui-Auch, 1999; Pownall, 2000; Ekchart et al., 2005; La Vina and Caleda, 2006). The strategic research and health bio­technology spearheaded by this Board provide a model and potential applications of this model of biotechnology devel­opment may emerge in other Asian countries.
     Increasing applications of biotechnology in agriculture and health may give pro-poor benefits but these are con­tingent upon new and modified ways of working, involv­ing new directions in science, new partners, finding and sustaining non-research partners and other complementary skills, the participation of poor people in identification and selection of problems and pro-active policies and institu­tional arrangements (Raina, 2003; Sahai, 2003; Hall, 2005; Chathaway et al., 2006; IDRC, 2006).
     Transgenic crops continue to receive substantial fund­ing from public and private sector research as well as several quasi-public-private organizations in ESAP. Several multi­national firms as well as international research institutes and universities have been investing heavily in biotechnol­ogy and transgenic research in Asian countries (Pray and Naseem, 2005). The Asia Pacific Association of Plant Tissue Culture and AgroBiotechnology have reasons for approving