Creating a Biotech co-op laboratory space in Timor-Leste, a place with no bioengineering laws

Im looking for a community to help create a biological laboratory Co-op in Timor Leste, a small country about 1.5 hours flight from Bali. It gained its independence from Indonesia in 2000, and is politically stable but very poor and in desperate need of better agriculture and economy.

Timor Leste currently has absolutely no laws on genetic technology--no patents, no research permits needed, no issues with distribution or export or selling.

That means we can create and distribute any kind of genetic technology anywhere on earth - no matter who thinks they "own" that tech.
We can create trees and crops that grow bigger and faster and more productive, we can alter the shape and expression of plant, and have them produce useful metabolites, or even antibodies against deadly diseases.
We can actually implement ways of disincentivizing deforesation, stop desertification, and bring food to salty soil, or eliminate major pests on the island.
All of these things Timor Leste sorely needs.

We need to discuss the exact implementation, goals, and strategy to establish Timor Leste as a Biotechnology haven that will allow us to use genetic engineering to its fullest extent to help the world and save its biodiversty, all while helping give a new and profitable industry to one of the poorest countries on earth that has been exploited by more powerful countries for decades.

We can eventually use the lab potentially as a place where we can assemble or distribute tech that would not be allowed in your home country

I have have a biological laboratory in Bali where we grow mushroom species commercially and do plant tissue culture. I am willing to put in time and effort to making this happen within the next year- but this lab will benefit everyone, and i want to make the space available to everyone the world over who is tired of the needless rules and restrictions on bio engineering at a time when our world needs it most.

Anyway, send me an email if your interested in contributing or helping out,
I put up a post on the biohacking facebook group, but im going to take it down in a few hours.

or send me an email at [email protected]

Comments

  • Ok, this is super cool! Please leave the post up in the Facebook group! Some people don't check there too often and I'd hate to have them miss out on hearing about this.
    I'd love to hear more about your current lab. What projects are you doing?
  • Interesting. That's awesome.
  • Ah, just had a talk with a timorese Lawyer, Not only are there zero regulations of any kind, but we are allowed to export anything we want, legally. It might be illegal to import other places, buts thats on the buyer, not us.

    Timors economy is basically just nationalized oil and gas, they are incredibly interested in diversifying their economy with literally ANYTHING ELSE, so she thinks we would be welcomed with open arms, especially if we start working to improve crops and livestock- they have a lot of food and water problems.

    As far as my lab in bali, i grow different mushroom species commercially, and now im trying to hybridize two species, and getting into plant tissue culture and recreating that recent paper on self sustained bio-luminescence in plants- the first thing i want to distribute to everyone in TL

  • I've got a labspace to in California. We're working on a cellulose sheets. Many have done kombucha leather. We're trying to grow the sheets on agricultural waste from the central valley in order to make it more economically feasible. Grown on sugars from a crop... Unless everyone replaces soda with kombucha real quick.. there's no way you could afford to use this source of cellulose as construction material. But from ag waste? It's pretty much free.

    There's a lot of potential in your idea of you get it rolling.
  • I'm down.
  • edited May 2020
    Any updates on this?
  • updates are on the sci house discord
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