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UFS hosts first-of-its-kind webinar on Environment and Biosafety Research Ethics

13 August 2024 | Story André Damons | Photo Supplied

Maricel-van-Rooyen — Maricél van Rooyen, Project Manager for Research Information Management System (RIMS) and Research Ethics Adviser in the Directorate Research Development (DRD) at the University of the Free State (UFS), is the Programme Coordinator for a first-of-its-kind Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association (SARIMA)/ COP webinar on Environment and Biosafety Research Ethics.

The University of the Free State (UFS) is playing host to a first-of-its-kind webinar on Environment and Biosafety Research Ethics later this month with Maricél van Rooyen, Project Manager for Research Information Management System (RIMS) and Research Ethics Adviser in the Directorate Research Development (DRD), playing a pivotal role.

The webinar, which is part of the Eastern Region Community of Practice (COP), is taking place on 20 August. The target market for this virtual workshop is Biosafety and Environmental Research Ethics Committee (REC) chairpersons and members, professionals including research management professionals, administrators, research compliance managers and advisers, and research directors in Southern Africa and beyond.

Van Rooyen will be the Programme Coordinator for this Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association (SARIMA)/ COP Research Ethics Webinar, while Prof Robert Bragg, chairperson of the UFS Environmental and Biological Research Ethics Committee (EBREC), will give a presentation on the establishment of an EBREC.

The UFS, Stellenbosch University and the University of the Witwatersrand, form part of the COP which is a SARIMA (Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association) initiative to assist and share research ethics questions between institutions to empower research management and ethics compliance. SARIMA assisted with the online hosting and advertising of the webinar.

Purpose of the webinar

“Environment and Biosafety Committees in South Africa are a new idea, and only a few institutions in the country have such a committee. The UFS and the other institutions that will present at the workshop, take a leading role because they have already registered committees in place. We want to share and assist with establishing and operating such committees,” says Van Rooyen.

According to her, the need for the webinar arises from the upsurge of research and innovation in biotechnology and related fields over the past two decades that has led to exciting new discoveries in areas such as the engineering of biological processes, gene editing, stem cell research, CRISPR-Cas9 technology, Synthetic Biology, recombinant DNA, LMOs and GMOs, to mention only a few.

These advances, however, have generated concerns about biosafety, biosecurity and adverse impacts on biodiversity and the environment, leading to the establishment of Research Ethics Committees (RECs) at Higher Education and Research Institutions dedicated to reviewing research with implications for biosafety and the environment.

These EBRECs are in the early stages of their establishment and formalisation in South Africa, and there is much uncertainty about their composition, scope, procedures of decision-making and the principles that should guide their deliberations and assessments.

Leading the charge

The UFS took the lead in South Africa in ensuring international ethical compliance in this extended area of research, by establishing its own Environmental and Biological Research Ethics Committee (EBREC) six years ago. The UFS EBREC is one of only two such ethics committees at a South African university that combines the biosafety committee with environmental and biological research ethics to ensure ethics compliance in these fields. The initiative started with Van Rooyen and her RIMS EthicsTeam, (Willem Kilian and Amanda Smith). The university is again taking charge with this webinar, which is a first of its kind.

News Archive

#Women’sMonth: Who am I? Questions of identity among Rwandan rape survivors

2017-08-03

Michelle Nöthling, master’s degree student
in the Centre for Trauma, Forgiveness, and
Reconciliation Studies at the UFS.
Photo: Eugene Seegers

From 7 April to 15 July 1994, a mass genocide swept through Rwanda after years of Belgian colonial rule that divided the country along ethnic lines. Rape was also used as part of a political strategy to torture and humiliate mainly Tutsi women, and as a means of spreading HIV.

Individual focus
Why is it important to listen to what these rape survivors have to say? Michelle Nöthling, a master’s student in the UFS Centre for Trauma, Forgiveness, and Reconciliation Studies, responds, “We speak of groups – refugees, foreigners, and the like – yet we tend to forget the individuals and the lasting impact trauma has had on each person.”

Narrative exploration
Michelle maintains that we are the product of the narratives around us; things like – how to be a woman, how to dress, speak, or treat others. Her research delves into how these rape survivors see themselves, how they narrate their lives. She also investigates power relations based on gender; for example, how language can be used as a divisive tool.

Rwandan backdrop
In Rwanda, gender roles are deeply entrenched. Traditionally, a ‘girl’ remains such while she is a virgin. Her transition into womanhood is usually marked by marriage and followed by motherhood. But rape disrupts this structure, leading to an identity crisis as these girls are catapulted into motherhood with an unplanned child resulting from a traumatic event.

“We are the product of
the narratives around us.”

Reaching their mid-teens, the children, too, started asking questions about identity or paternity. For those mothers who were finally able to open up to their children, the experience has been mostly liberating – often leading to a closer relationship between parent and child. Michelle intends to interrogate how such significant moments shape the way these women perceive themselves. Research tends to portray these survivors solely as mothers of rape-born children. Michelle, however, seeks to examine their identities more deeply.

“These survivors still bear the heavy burden of being marginalised, stigmatised, and severely humiliated. Despite this, they have developed their own communities of belonging; people with whom they connect, to whom they relate, and to whom they are not ashamed to tell their experiences,” she said.

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