HORTICULTURAL BIOTECHNOLOGY, AS EFFICIENT MEANS FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIES SUGGESTED BY K. EREKY

In the final years of the 19^th century and the first decades of the next, research at the interface of biology, industrial technology and philosophy progressed considerably.
It seemed to scientific and industrial entrepreneurs that sciences dealing with the biological processes of living organisms such as biochemistry, physiology and later molecular biology, were ready to be exploited technologically.
By means of an international collaboration, we have identified and analyzed forgotten publications of the Hungarian engineer, Károly (Karl) Ereky, who coined the term “biotechnology”. In these papers we have found interesting ideas as well as pioneer research projects and patents.
They were based on Ereky’s biotechnological doctrine which was related directly to the problem of the agrarian reform, an urgent problem of the period around World War 1 (1914/1920). Many continue to have a resonance in our time.
It was Ereky’s strong conviction that the accomplishment of land reform, together with the conscious application of agricultural biotechnology would benefit the food supply of humanity through reasonable use of natural resources of our planet.
To face this great and continuing challenge to mankind, Ereky proposed a stable solution more than eighty years ago.

IV International Symposium on In Vitro Culture and Horticultural Breeding

M.G. Fari, E.A. Menezes, R. Bud, P.U. Kralovanszky

Father of the term

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2001.560.114