Policy Analysis and Advocacy Programme
(PAAP)
Electronic Newsletter
26 February 2010Volume 13 Number 03
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVED BIOSAFETY REGULATIONS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
Small-scale, resource-poor farmers in developing countries face daily stresses, including poor soils, drought, and lack of inputs. Ongoing trends such as climate change and population growth will likely exacerbate binding stresses. A new generation of genetically engineered (GE) crop research aims to alleviate these pressures through the improvement of subsistence crops-such as cassava, sorghum, and millet-that incorporate traits such as tolerance to drought, water, and aluminum in soils as well as plants with more efficient nitrogen and phosphor use. However, many developing countries lack the necessary biosafety systems for a timely and cost-effective adoption. This brief by the International Food and Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) focuses on the regulatory reforms necessary for farmers and consumers in developing countries to benefit from GE crops.
Introduction: One step behind the technology
B
EFORE GE crops are released to farmers, technology developers must demonstrate to regulatory authorities that their products are safe by applying widely accepted risk-assessment procedures.Yet, as many as 100 developing countries lack the technical and management capacity needed to review tests and monitor compliance. A growing number of countries have begun investing in developing national biosafety frameworks, and some have approved confined field trials for GE crops, but progress is still slow. Only two African countries-Burkina Faso and South Africa-have approved a GE crop release for commercial purposes, of which only South Africa has actually released commercial GE crops. Furthermore, if the regulatory safety standards are set to an impossibly high threshold (at zero risk), GE crops are unlikely to be approved.
Even in areas where biosafety systems are in place, many public-sector and university-based scientists cannot afford the regulatory compliance costs, which range from tens of thousands to millions of dollars. In some countries (such as the Philippines), the cost of complying with biosafety regulations can sometimes be greater than the cost of developing a new crop variety. As a result, multinational private companies have led GE crop development and transfer in the developing world. Aside from financial resources, large private companies have extensive experience; ample capacity to evaluate risk and comply with regulatoryrequirements; and the scientific capacity for product development, risk management, and stewardship. However, the private sector does not focus on the crops grown by the poor, finding itdifficult to justify paying large regulatory costs for products with limited returns—particularly when facing indefinite delays for regulatory decisions.
Despite these limitations, public-sector research organizations, such as national agricultural research systems and international agricultural research centers, have in recent years invested in research and development for GE crops suited to developing-country farmers. These public organizations are only now facing regulatory requirements and costs of approval. How public organizations address these challenges will determine the impact of GE technologies on food production in much of the world. If regulatory costs are equal to those seen in developed countries for large commercial crops, and if final approval remains uncertain, it is unlikely that many of these potentially useful crops will end up in the hands of smallholder farmers.
In addition to creating regulatory bottlenecks for crops, the high cost of compliance with biosafety regulations can limit investments in developing GE products and thus reduce the flow of potentially valuable crops that reach farmers. Regulatory delays often have a larger negative impact on societal benefits than regulatory compliance costs.
Developing effective biosafety regulations
So far, GE crops released deliberately have a remarkable safety record. No proven or documented damage to human health or the environment has been reported for any of the approved GE crops to date. Many major science academies in Europe and the United States, international agencies, and national and regional regulatory agencies officially endorse this safety record. However, novel crops and traits that will enter the regulatory pipeline may present a new set of challenges for regulatory agencies and biosafety systems.Biosafety regulatory systems assess, manage, and communicate the objective risks posed by GE crops to human health, the environment, and biodiversity. Benefits, costs, and implications of the potential introduction of the technology have received only cursory attention from most regulatory systems. Moreover, regulatory agencies have not fully considered the implications of turning down safe and valuable technologies. Failing to approve new technologies that may benefit poor farmers and consumers carries its own set of risks.
Undesirable conventional agriculture production practices may result in overexposure to chemical pesticides or incomplete pest-damage abatement, negatively impacting food safety and security.Biosafety regulatory systems thus need to balance objective risks to human health and the environment against the potential risk of lost opportunities to increase agricultural production, introducenovel crops, and enhance the livelihoods of poor people.The key to delivering safe, valuable, and appropriate GEtechnologies to farmers in poor countries is to design smart andefficient regulatory systems that countries with lower scientificand financial capacity can readily implement. Developingcountries need smart and efficient biosafety regulations thatprotect society from unsafe products—though not necessarilymore regulation. Regulatory agencies need to base such regulationson risk-assessment procedures with a history of success inother countries. Many international documents, such as Annex IIIto the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, articulate principles ofbiosafety, risk assessment, and risk management. Furthermore,establishing sensible regulations does not have to be complicatedas long as the process is robust, transparent, and participative.Most importantly, biosafety needs to be a process trustedby society. A number of policy and regulatory system options areavailable for improving biosafety processes.
- Match the level of regulation to the level of risk
The foundation of many biosafety systems has been the CartagenaProtocol on Biosafety, an implementing internationalagreement that is part of the Convention on Biological Diversity.The text of the Cartagena Protocol introduces the use of theprecautionary approach, giving regulators the active responsibilityof anticipating and minimizing harm to the environmentand human health. Countries have interpreted the precautionary approach in different ways, with some focusing on unlikelyhypothetical risks and asserting that no level of risk is acceptable.
Other countries have established functional systems inwhich the scope of the precautionary approach fits within theframework of modern risk-assessment methods and objectivedecision-making standards.The scope of risk assessment and management effortsneeds to be directly proportional to the actual level of riskpresented by a GE crop. Regulators should balance risks by applyingbiosafety assessment approaches that are scientificallysound and thorough but do not impose unnecessary burdenson crop developers based on unrealistic assessments of risk.GE-crop events or constructs with assessed low risk do notrequire increased regulation. Countries can consider a variety ofregulatory approaches, such as “fast tracking” crops with traitsthat have received regulatory approval in other countries andfocusing only on the specific issues that may pose an objectiverisk domestically. As a result, a GE-crop event or construct couldbe approved after a simplified risk assessment and proceed tothe next stage of approval.
- Adopt flexible regulatory frameworks
Biosafety regulatory frameworks have to be sufficiently flexible,so they can be readily implemented. For example, national regulatorysystems could accept data generated elsewhere on a newtechnology. The scope for this approach is greater in assessingfood safety than environmental safety, as local conditions morefrequently determine the latter.Institutional organizations also can contribute to efficientbiosafety systems. For example, a “single window–singleregulator” mechanism, as adopted in Australia and proposed inIndia, can centralize decision-making and ease the regulatoryprocess for applicants. The use of formal evaluation frameworksmay also be helpful. The biosafety conceptual framework ofthe International Service for National Agricultural Research/International Food Policy Research Institute and theFood and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations canserve as a guide to examine such issues as a country’s inventoryof human, physical, and financial resources as well itsinstitutional capacity. The framework clearly spells out thevarious trade-offs and options in designing, implementing, andrevising a national biosafety system.
Regulators should adopt novel approaches to risk assessmentand decision-making. They might use environmentalmodeling tools based on similar environmental conditions, orexamine regulatory experience with similar crops in similarenvironments in order to yield important lessons for regulatinga specific GE crop in a specific location. Adopting newregulatory paradigms for novel crops such as bananas orsweet potatoes-where regulators examine gene constructsrather than events-will help expedite the process without asignificant decrease in safety. Ultimately, governments canenable the risk-assessment process by using a variety of meansto reach the regulatory objective.
- Enact performance-based rather than prescriptive regulations
Most regulatory systems establish a set of prescriptive regulatoryprocesses with which the applicant must comply. In mostcases, however, prescriptive regulatory systems have littleflexibility to adapt to accumulated knowledge and experiencewith the specific crop and gene construct or with GE crops ingeneral. In contrast, performance-based regulations concentrateon regulatory outcomes or results rather than prescribedtechniques, procedures, or processes. These types of regulationsgive applicants the flexibility to comply with safetystandards in innovative ways while respecting the goals of theregulatory process.
- Make greater use of innovative risk-assessment methods for regulatory purposes
An efficient biosafety system implies a risk-assessment processbased on confined field trials to evaluate potential impacts onbiodiversity and food/feed safety, taking into account other characteristicssuch as history of safe use, biology and physiology ofthe organism, and food-safety assessments. Developing countriesmust ensure that the implementation process is both feasibleand focused on the right questions.Environmental risk assessments tend to be quite specific toa particular agro-ecological area, and data generated elsewheretherefore tends to be less applicable for specific agro-environmentallocations.
Tiered approaches can reduce regulatoryburdens. In tiered approaches, risk analysts compare the GEcrop’s risk profile in a particular area with the risk profile of thesame GE crop in a similar agro-ecological zone. For example, inHancock’s (2003) procedure, a preliminary assessment of theenvironmental risk of GE crops compiles data on the geographicalrange of compatible relative species, determines the invasivenessof the crop and its relatives, and describes the modifiedcrop’s properties. As a result, regulators can define the type ofexperimentation that developers need to conduct before thecrop’s approval for environmental release. Other internationallyaccepted approaches available for use in developing countriescan also reduce the regulatory burden.
- Rationalize the application process
When a developer proposed a GE cassava for a confined fieldtrial in Nigeria, the application form consisted of 150 questions.The completed application form totaled 60 pages and requiredsignificant human and financial resources-beyond the capacityof many public-sector institutions. After several consultationswith relevant stakeholders, the IFPRI-led Program for BiosafetySystems managed to reduce the number of questions to thoserelevant to making an appropriate decision for confined fieldtrials while eliminating other unnecessary information requirements.This rationalization process reduced significantly theregulatory burden needed to comply with biosafety regulationswithout sacrificing safety, by concentrating solely on thosequestions relevant to the risk-assessment process.
- Understand the effects of regulation
Regulators and policymakers need to understand regulatorypolicies in terms of costs, benefits, and safety trade-offs for bothapproval and non-approval of GE crop technologies, as well asthe cumulative (and, in some cases, unanticipated) impacts ofregulation. They should also be sensitive to the constraints thatapplicants and technology innovators are likely to face in dealingwith the regulations, while contributing to an environment thatenables collaboration among all stakeholders and ensures theoverall success of biosafety regulations.
Policymakers and regulators must keep in mind that regulationentails costs and benefits, beginning with budgeting for thedevelopment and maintenance of institutions, procedures, andmanagement tools for implementing biosafety. Other relevantcosts include the cost of compliance with biosafety regulationsand risk-management conditions, as well as the economic,environmental, and health costs related to delayed access to newtechnologies and products and their associated benefits. Decision makersmust also recognize that, while new GE crops may berisky, they may also have significant net benefits to society.In the end, the regulatory authority must consider all the risksand benefits of approval or rejection of the proposed technology,by comparing the technology to the counterfactual casebefore rendering a decision.
7. Pursue regional approaches to risk assessment andfacilitate knowledge exchange
A relatively easy and cost-effective way to assess, manage, andcommunicate the biosafety of GE crops is to share data andexperience on risk-assessment efforts regionally and globally.The Biosafety Clearinghouse of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafetyfacilitates the exchange of knowledge by maintaining adepository of regulatory decisions and other regulatory-relatedknowledge and enabling data-sharing among countries that areparties to the Protocol. Bilateral and multilateral mechanismscan also pool human and financial resources and expertise: theCommon Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) is currentlyimplementing the Regional Approaches to Biosafety andBiotechnology Regulations.Expanded use of internationally accepted consensus canpromote the acceptance of regional approaches to regulation.Examples include the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) document on the scientific aspectsof risk assessment, as well as guidelinesissued by internationalstandard-setting bodies such as the International Plant ProtectionConvention and the Codex Alimentarius.
Conclusion
A new generation of GE crops now in development-especiallyby the public sector in developing countries-has the potentialto benefit poor farmers and ultimately reduce food insecurityand poverty. Developing countries will need to develop andimplement effective approaches for assessing and managing the potential benefits and risks of GE crops. However, a poorlydesigned biosafety assessment and management process candiscourage the development of valuable technologies (includingGE crops) through costly regulatory delays that can compromisetechnology delivery; or it may constitute a barrier to public sectordeveloped products by imposing high biosafety regulatorycompliance costs. Such regulatory delays and excessive compliancecosts are most burdensome for public-sector and smallprivate firms in developing countries, which are the firms mostlikely to develop GE-crop technologies of particular value inmeeting local needs.
Many innovative approaches for cost-effective risk assessmentare available to developing-country policymakers and regulators.Flexible and efficient biosafety systems will help developingcountries benefit not only from the GE crops currently in thepipeline, but also from the unforeseen agricultural technologiesthat will emerge in the future. Innovative approaches are requiredto meet the challenges of increasing food production to supportgrowing populations in a sustainable manner. Additional policypriorities and constraints complicate technology’s role in broaderagricultural development goals as the need exists to reduceenvironmental impact, increase resiliency, and improve livelihoods,while also considering the impacts of climate change. It isprudent, then, for developing countries to explore and criticallyassess all options available-including both established agriculturalpractices and emerging technologies, such as GE crops-andintegrate them into efficient, locally adapted farming systems.
This brief was prepared by Jose Falck-Zepeda, Anthony Cavalieri and Patricia Zambrano of the International Food and Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). It is available at:
COMMUNICATION
2010 AWARD FELLOWSHIPS
African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD), a project of the CGIAR Gender & Diversity Program, is now accepting applications for its 2010 fellowships. African women working in agricultural research and development from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia who have completed a bachelor’s, master’s or doctoral degree in selected disciplines are invited to apply. More information can be found in the he attachment below or
PAAP received this information from Recke Helga of Gender & Diversity, she is gratefully acknowledged
Research calls
The Canadian International Food Security Research Fund (CIFSRF) has announced the launch of two calls:1) A limited, competitive call for proposals from organizations already working on research in partnership with each other. The deadline for submission of proposals for this call is 15March 2010, and 2) An open, competitive call for concept notes, which may come from existing or new partnerships. The deadline for submission of concept notes is 31March 2010. Further information is available at
PAAP received this information from Wendy Manchur of IDRC, she is gratefully acknowledged
Excellence scholarships for PhD students
The Food Security Center (FSC) will award up to 12 scholarships for PhD students from developing countries for a period of 36 months, beginning 01 August 2010. There will be up to 2 scholarships offered to PhD students from developed countries. The scholarship is given for a stay at the Universität Hohenheim in Stuttgart, Germany. More information is available at
PAAP received this information from Abebe Demissie of AGROBIO, ASARECA, he is gratefully acknowledged.
GalilleeCollege – International Agriculture Training Centre (IATC)
The IATC provides a broad spectrum of programmes all availing relevant skills for government officers, trainers and advisors as well as private farmers. Scholarships provided by the college cover the entire tuition fee. For additional information contact Ms. Carmel