Who is most likely to gain if the pharma crop industry were to be successful?
The largest gains, in the form of potentially lower production costs, would go to pharma crop, pharmaceutical, and biotechnology companies that own the technology. However, the reduction in production costs will depend on the containment needed to protect the food supply from pharma crop contamination. Containment-related costs may be high enough to at least partially outweigh potential savings in other areas of drug production. Consumers might benefit from possibly lower drug costs (if production savings were actually achieved and passed along to consumers) and potentially greater availability of certain drugs. Universities and private research firms might benefit in the form of research contracts.
