On Sep. 15, 2021, ASM and the undersigned organizations issued the following letter to Congressional leadership requesting the bioeconomy be included in a final competitiveness package.

Dear Speaker Pelosi, Leader Schumer, Leader McConnell and Leader McCarthy,

The undersigned organizations and institutions, representing hundreds of thousands of individuals and entities working in science, technology, engineering, medicine and mathematics, would like to call your attention to the recent reintroduction of the bipartisan “Bioeconomy Research and Development Act of 2021.” The bill’s co-sponsors worked closely with the scientific community to draft legislation that will provide much needed support and coordination to bio-based research and development. The Bioeconomy Research and Development Act of 2021 was included in the Senate-passed U.S. Innovation and Competition Act earlier this year, and we request its inclusion in the final competitiveness package as it moves forward.

The rapid acceleration of discovery demonstrates a need for better cross-agency coordination, greater technology needs and data sharing infrastructure. The Bioeconomy Research and Development Act of 2021 will create a national initiative to advance engineering biology and strengthen the ability to translate scientific discoveries into tools, technologies and therapies that will benefit Americans, our economy and the world at large. This bipartisan legislation will facilitate collaboration, cross-agency funding, database curation and the development of novel tools to accelerate translational research.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made abundantly clear how necessary it is to have a highly collaborative and well-resourced national scientific enterprise. Scientists of all disciplines played, and will continue to play, a key role in the development of COVID-19 diagnostics, treatments and vaccines. This legislation will help ensure that our scientific community has the tools it needs to continue to address future threats to the global economy, our shared environment and oceans and human health.

Given the broad support for this legislation and the growing importance of the bioeconomy across economic sectors, we ask that the Bioeconomy Research and Development Act of 2021 be included as part of a larger competitiveness package moving forward this calendar year. Thank you again for your leadership.

Sincerely,

Academy for Radiology & Biomedical Imaging Research
American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association of Mycobacterial Diseases
American Dairy Science Association
American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering
American Institute of Biological Sciences
American Society for Microbiology
American Society for Nutrition
American Society for Virology
American Society of Agronomy
American Society of Animal Science
American Society of Plant Biologists
Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities
Biophysical Society
Biotechnology Innovation Organization
Boston University
C3 Think Tank
Crop Science Society of America
Ecological Society of America
FASS
Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology
Foundation for Scalable Innovations
Institute of Food Technologists
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Mycobacterial Diseases of Animals – Multistate Initiative
National Alliance for Eye and Vision Research
National Postdoctoral Association
Pacific Biosciences
SoAR Foundation
Society for Pediatric Radiology
Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
Soil Science Society of America
University of California San Diego
University of California System
University of Maine
University of Wisconsin-Madison

Tell Congress to Support Bioeconomy Act