Is science-based risk assessment adequate for the evaluation of the environmental impacts of biotechnology?
A. Science-based risk assessment identifies potential hazards, quantifies the probabilities those hazards will occur and accounts for uncertainty with significant safety thresholds – typically set at 1000 times the likely level that a risk will occur. This approach is wholly compatible with precaution. The science-based process, according to a former undersecretary of Commerce in the Clinton administration, David Aaron, has “shown us that biotech foods developed and used in the U.S. present no safety risk beyond those of their ‘natural’ counterparts. Not a single ailment has been attributed to biotech foods. Not one. Not a sneeze, not a rash, not a headache.” Similarly, environmental scares ranging from Monarch butterfly impacts to increased pesticide use to advanced hybrid superweeds have all been disproved by adequate research or avoided by appropriate agricultural practice or regulatory standards. The Precautionary Principle as adopted in the 1992 Rio Declaration calls only for cost
