A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ENVIRONMENT RISK ASSESSMENT GUIDELINES FOR GENETICALLY ENGINEERED PLANTS OF DEVELOPING AND DEVELOPED COUNTRIES INCLUDING BANGLADESH

Syeda Fahria Hoque Mimmi,Aparna Islam

doi:10.26480/gws.02.2021.21.28

Abstract

Genetically Engineered (GE) plants are the demand of time for increased need of food. The regulation system, followed from the development of a GE plant to its release into the environment is categorized into separate stages for maintaining the proper biosafety including Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA). ERA identifies potential risks and its impacts through science based evaluation process where it follows a case by case study. All the countries dealing with GE plants follow specific guidelines to conduct a successful ERA. In this study, ERA guidelines of 4 developing and 4 developed countries including Bangladesh were compared in terms of required data and information against ten criteria. Surprisingly, an adequate amount of data and information requirements (e.g. if the intended modification has been achieved or not, growth habit of GE plants, potential adverse effects on the human health etc.) matched between all the countries. However, a few differences of data requirement such as agronomic conventions of non-transformed plants, clear description of experimental procedures followed etc. were also observed in the study. Moreover, the result indicates that only a few countries provide instructions on the quality of the data used for ERA. Thus, if the similarities are recognized in a more framed manner then the approval pathway of GE plants can be shared.

Highlights

It is important to evaluate every possible risk prior to the release of Genetically Engineered (GE) plants into the environment
Several structured steps, pertained by the systemic process, are followed till the final decision making and is collectively called Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA). It is an essential part of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CPB) which provides a unified source of required information for the safe handling and transportation of GE organisms including plants
The purpose of this study is to explore the ERA guidelines of developed (US, Australia, Canada, the European Union-EU) and developing countries (India, Argentina, Brazil); further to compare these with ERA guideline of Bangladesh which was gadgeted by the government of Bangladesh in 2016

Summary

Introduction

It is important to evaluate every possible risk prior to the release of Genetically Engineered (GE) plants into the environment. Such evaluation includes a systemic process that analyzes the quantitative and qualitative impacts of GE plants on the environment as well as on human health. Several structured steps, pertained by the systemic process, are followed till the final decision making and is collectively called Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA). It is an essential part of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CPB) which provides a unified source of required information for the safe handling and transportation of GE organisms including plants. A significant increase in growth rates was recorded by Vietnam, the Philippines, Colombia and Indonesia upon adopting GE plants (ISAAA, 2020a)

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