Principles for building public-private partnerships to benefit food safety, nutrition, and health research

Abstract

The present article articulates principles for effective public-private partnerships (PPPs) in scientific research. Recognizing that PPPs represent one approach for creating research collaborations and that there are other methods outside the scope of this article, PPPs can be useful in leveraging diverse expertise among government, academic, and industry researchers to address public health needs and questions concerned with nutrition, health, food science, and food and ingredient safety. A three-step process was used to identify the principles proposed herein: step 1) review of existing PPP guidelines, both in the peer-reviewed literature and at 16 disparate non-industry organizations; step 2) analysis of relevant successful or promising PPPs; and step 3) formal background interviews of 27 experienced, senior-level individuals from academia, government, industry, foundations, and non-governmental organizations. This process resulted in the articulation of 12 potential principles for establishing and managing successful research PPPs. The review of existing guidelines showed that guidelines for research partnerships currently reside largely within institutions rather than in the peer-reviewed literature. This article aims to introduce these principles into the literature to serve as a framework for dialogue and for future PPPs.

Public-Private Partnerships in Nutrition

“…A key recommendation outlined in the article is that the partners engage in frequent, transparent communication, both internally and externally, and that communicating is crucial for effectiveness not just within but also about the PPP. 6 …”

“…Among these steps are a series of communication outreach effortsVpublic listening sessions, frequent and open partner conferences, and detailed reports. The study, to be peer reviewed and published in a major nutrition journal, will test the progress of the PPP against the principles laid out in the previous article 6 and offer a dispassionate critique of the process and its success or lack of success in achieving the PPP goals. And there are other potential benefits: the multitude of participating partners in PPPs and the varied perspectives they bring to the scientific enterprise enlarge the audience interested in hearing about the progress.…”

“…6 Such a direct challenge to the credibility and trustworthiness of information delivered about research PPPs must certainly be kept in mind by nutrition and other research communicators.…”

“…Such PPPs are in fact the subject of a published paper setting out 12 possible guidelines or principles for navigating the obstacles around merging public and private interest. 6 Those principles reflect a synthesis of guidelines adopted by nearly 2 dozen organizations that were reviewed, as well as input from 27 senior-level authorities from academia, government, industry, foundations, and nongovernmental organizations. Among the guidelines proposed are rules for selecting partners committed to the long term, for including researchers in both public and private sectors (as well as academics), for mitigating potential conflicts of interest, sharing planning and funding, and other issues.…”

Application and Public Sector Focus of Public-Private Partnerships (PPP)

“…The existence of PPP model is based on the contract, the concession agreement and the ownership of ownership, on this basis can be used to achieve a variety of forms. According to China's actual situation, the PPP project implementation of the infrastructure projects can be used in a variety of different modes of operation [6]. Table 1 shows the different types of facilities for the application.…”