In terms of numbers and volume of meat produced, the Chinese beef industry is one of the largest in the world. Development of the industry has only occurred within the last thirty years, and despite extensive cross-breeding programs with imported breeds, performance of Chinese cattle is low, and the industry is still subject to traditional farming methods. This study looks at the Australian-developed genetic evaluation system BREEDPLAN, which is regarded worldwide as one of the best systems for assisting with selection of beef cattle for increased performance by evaluating genetics and identifying superior animals, and asks if BREEDPLAN can be successfully applied to the Chinese beef industry. Issues discussed include the complementarity of BREEDPLAN to existing Chinese breeding programs and the benefits of BREEDPLAN if introduced, as well as opportunities for Australians to provide consultancy services to facilitate introduction. The marketing of Australian genetic material in China, and cross-cultural marketing issues are also considered. Field research was conducted in China using itinerant interviews and observational research, together with unstructured, informal interviews and discussions with Australian beef industry experts. It is found that breed improvement programs in China are controlled by the Ministry of Agriculture, and management practises within the government-run herds make them eminently suitable for the application of BREEDPLAN. The objective measurements of BREEDPLAN would provide observable genetic gain, resulting in increased industry productivity and profitability. In addition, it is found that a need exists within the Chinese beef industry for consultants not only with expertise and knowledge about BREEDPLAN, but also with an understanding of Chinese language and culture, which would be an advantage for dealing with cross-cultural difficulties. Market opportunities for Australian genetic material are considerable, but not unlimited, and further research is required to assess the size of the market. It is recommended that immediate steps be taken to introduce BREEDPLAN to the Chinese beef industry.

This thesis explores the environmental politics surrounding agricultural biotechnology innovations and diffusion. Recent developments in agricultural biotechnology are accompanied by growing social concerns that such innovations pose risks to the environment and to human health. Biosafety is a term used to discuss the possibility of such risks. Currently, the regulation of agricultural gene-technology and biosafety are contentious environmental issues for national and international policy communities. However, detailed studies of the conflicts and complexities generated by biotechnology for environmental governance are scarce. In particular, little is understood of the ways in which biotechnology issues emerge on regulatory agendas, and research gaps remain on how differing perspectives of biotechnological risks impact on policy outcomes. This thesis makes a significant contribution to these outstanding research issues. My contribution is a new analytical framework that unearths the discursive role biotechnology plays in constructing international environmental policy regimes. I develop this framework on the understanding that the use of language resources like storylines, metaphors and other rhetorical devices are critical in shaping environmental policy in general and biotechnology governance in particular. This analytical framework couples a language analysis to an investigation of the practices of institutional power. The result is a discourse analysis that provides important and useful insights into the theory and practice of biosafety policy. In other words, my thesis explores both the ‘talking’ and the ‘doing’ of policymaking and thereby provides new insights into the contested and uncertain environmental policy area of international gene-technology regulation. Specifically, I undertake a discourse analysis of international biosafety politics within the Convention on Biological Diversity. I apply my discourse analysis to a case study: the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety to the Convention on Biological Diversity, 2000. My research provides a different reading of international gene-technology politics, one that questions the constructed nature of biotechnology as a policy problem and reveals the power relations involved in producing particular policy options and outcomes on biosafety. There are a number of key research findings that emerged from the application of my discursive analytical framework to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. I find that biosafety is a highly fluid concept. It can enlarge or contract depending on the way in which language resources are mobilised by policy actors and interest groups to secure definitions and generate consensus around their preferred understandings of biosafety. Moreover, my research indicates that the more radical texts for biosafety can be recast by dominant interest groups into scripts for shallow reform agendas. Institutionalised policy practices also effect policy outcomes. My research finds that the use of Expert Panels, for example, is important in shaping international policy communities’ understanding of the policy problems posed by biotechnology risks. In the light of these findings, my thesis argues that the ability of interest groups and policy actors to win language games within institutional settings also enables them to secure their preferred policy outcomes. I import the concept of authorship as a new policy concept to discuss the ways in which such groups exercise social power to secure their understanding of biosafety, which thereby effect the ‘writing’ of the dominant accounts of what constitutes an acceptable international biosafety standard within the Cartagena Protocol. In short, my thesis is a new account of biosafety politics that fills some of the current knowledge gaps about how biotechnology is emerging onto regulatory agendas. It also demonstrates the mechanisms of power and the language struggles that determine biosafety policy outcomes within multi-lateral environmental agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity.