Gregory Conko
Senior Fellow

Gregory Conko is a Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a Washington, DC-based public interest group. His research at CEI focuses on issues of food and pharmaceutical drug safety regulation, and on the general treatment of health risks in public policy. He is particularly interested in the debate over the safety of biotechnology and bioengineered foods, as well as the application of the Precautionary Principle to domestic and international environmental and safety regulations.

Mr. Conko is also the Vice President and a member of the Board of Directors of the Auburn, Alabama-based AgBioWorld Foundation, a non-profit organization he co-founded in 2000 with Tuskegee University plant genetics professor C.S. Prakash. The AgBioWorld Foundation provides information to teachers, journalists, policymakers, and the general public about developments in plant science, biotechnology, and sustainable agriculture.

Mr. Conko’s book, The Frankenfood Myth: How Protest and Politics Threaten the Biotech Revolution (Praeger, 2004), co-authored with Henry I. Miller, was named by Barron’s as one of the 25 best books of 2004. His other writings have appeared in such journals as Nature Biotechnology, Transgenic Research, Politics and the Life Sciences, the Richmond Journal of Law & Technology, and the Cumberland Law Review, and in such newspapers as the Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal Europe and Asian Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle. He has appeared on numerous television and radio programs as a commentator on public health and consumer safety issues, and he frequently participates in international meetings on food safety and trade as a credentialed Non-Governmental Organization representative.

Mr. Conko is a member of the Board of Scientific and Policy Advisors for the New York-based American Council on Science and Health. He served as a principal investigator for the California Council on Science and Technology’s 2002 report Benefits and Risks of Food Biotechnology. He was selected by the American Swiss Foundation as one of 25 Young Leaders from the United States in 2001. And, in 2006, he was named by the journal Nature Biotechnology to its short list of "Who’s Who in Biotechnology."

Prior to joining CEI in 1994, Mr. Conko was a Research Associate with the Capital Research Center in Washington. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and History from the American University. And he received his Juris Doctor degree magna cum laude from the George Mason University School of Law, where he served as Articles Editor of the Journal of Law, Economics & Policy.




recent op-eds & articles

Where's the Beef?
By Gregory Conko, January 23, 2008

Europe's Continued Hostility to GM Crops Runs Afoul of Science, WTO
By Gregory Conko, January 22, 2008

Animal cloning no barnyard bijou
By Gregory Conko, December 13, 2006

Why spurning food biotech has become a liability
By Gregory Conko, Henry I. Miller, September 1, 2006

No, Rice Krispies Aren't Bio-Toxic
By Gregory Conko, August 24, 2006

» Read more op-eds & articles.

recent studies

FDA's Bad Medicine
By Gregory Conko, Jerome Arnett, August 13, 2008

Drug Reimportation's Dangerous Allure
By Gregory Conko, April 24, 2008

Promoting Healthy Biopharmaceutical Competition
By Gregory Conko, November 28, 2007

Dying for FDA Reform
By Gregory Conko, June 20, 2007

Healthy Competition
By Gregory Conko, May 22, 2007

» Read more studies.

news release

The Frankenfood Myth: How Protest and Politics Threaten the Biotech Revolution
By Gregory Conko, Henry I. Miller, August 20, 2004

Scientists and Scholars Denounce Position of the Catholic Institute for International Relations on GM Crops
By Gregory Conko, July 19, 2004

CEI Comments Before FDA on Bioengineered Foods
By Gregory Conko, May 4, 2001

» Read more news releases.

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