Introduction

Biotechnology, used for thousands of years in the service of food and nutrition, has expanded dramatically thanks to the opportunities opened up by genetic engineering. The Alimentarium temporary exhibition illuminates the various historical factors involved and presents the state of modern biotechnology with reference to concrete examples of microorganisms, plants and farm animals.

In order to inform the public openly, the exhibition needs to be displayed as an open forum, without preconceived ideas. As an explanation of facts and opinions, the exhibition encourages differential evaluation and decision-making. This is the only way we can do justice to this exceptionally complex specialist topic.


Through the Ages
From Neolithic times to the 21th century

Man is an observer. He seeks out food plants, cultivating and propagating them and also domesticates and crossbreeds farm animals. He has been intervening in nature for thousands of years – modifying it, shaping it to his needs. The goal has always been the same: to strengthen the food base, to preserve the more resistant and productive plants, and to improve man's more valuable livestock.

The technological progress achieved during the 19th and 20th centuries has yielded fascinating insights into a world that had never before been visible to the human eye. The structure of DNA, the knowledge of which has transformed and expanded our understanding of the biological processes taking place within the living cell, was only elucidated some fifty years ago. Molecular tools borrowed from nature now allow more specific and exact interventions in cellular processes.


By Way of Example
Working for Tomorrow's World - Into the 21st century

High-grade food crops ravaged by pests, weeds and blight, livestock lost to disease: these are urgent challenges that demand swift, sure action all over the world.

All possibilities, from classical breeding to genetically engineered disease resistance, from the use of chemical weed-killers to biological pest management, should be dispassionately examined for environmental compatibility and sustainability and put to use as appropriate. Nothing should be ruled out on ingrained ideological grounds, at the risk of forfeiting valuable strategies from the start. The exhibition illustrates modern bioengineering processes with numerous examples, showing present and future applications and discussing problems to which responsible answers must be found.