A recent editorial in the journal Nature that accused the Canadian government of muzzling its scientists doesn’t apply to researchers with Agriculture, says a director general with the department.
Stephen Morgan-Jones said Agriculture Canada scientists are encouraged to share their research with producers and are free to share their opinions on agricultural science with journalists.
“As an organization, we are extremely open with the stuff that we do,” said Morgan-Jones from his Agriculture Canada office in Lethbridge.
“I don’t know of any case where we have withheld information from the public, which has been collected and funded by taxpayer dollars.”
Earlier this month one of the world’s leading science journals, Nature, slammed the Canadian government for its policies on science communication. The federal government, an editorial in Nature noted, prizes message control over the free flow of information, as government communication staff vet topics and questions submitted by journalists before a scientist is permitted to speak to a reporter.
On controversial topics, such as atmospheric research, government scientists have not been allowed to speak with the media, even though the research was published in a public journal, Nature noted.
Morgan-Jones, who had not read the Nature article before being interviewed by The Western Producer, said Agriculture Canada scientists are not muzzled.
Yet, researchers within the department are expected to follow a process before they speak with a journalist. The scientists are supposed to report a media request to a government communications specialist before proceeding with the interview.
Morgan-Jones made it clear that it’s not an approval process because communication staff don’t decide whether an interview proceeds.
Most of the time the process is a formality, he said. If the topic is controversial, such as greenhouse gas emissions or genetically modified organisms, the process might become more complex, he added.
“We want to make quite sure that we’ve got our facts right, in terms of responding to the media. The process is also designed to identify there is a sensitive area and whether we need to need to do a little more work in terms of providing the response to the media.”
In certain cases, Western Producer reporters have waited several days to more than a week for government communication staff to vet interview questions.
That sort of delay isn’t surprising, said Stephen Strauss, vice-president of the Canadian Science Writers’ Association. He said he’s heard of media requests climbing as high as the Privy Council before a scientist was allowed to speak with a journalist.
Delays aside, Agriculture Canada doesn’t control what scientists do or don’t say to the media, Morgan-Jones said.
“I know of no circumstance where we (the department) have directed any sort of response to a particular issue and told scientists that is the actual response that they have to give.”
As well, Agriculture Canada is committed to sharing its expertise, openly, with the public and producers.
“Eighty percent of the research we do is what we would regard as public good, for the benefit of the industry,” he said.
“We’re investing those research dollars on behalf of and for the farming sector. We want to transfer those results as effectively as possible.”
