A Conceptual Framework for Implementing Biosafety: Linking Policy, Capacity, and Regulation (original) (raw)

Products arising from modern biotechnology provide new opportunities to achieve sustainable productivity gains in agriculture. Concerns over their possible environmental and health implications stimulated regulatory mechanisms for food safety and environmental risk assessment. Over the past two decades, national biosafety frameworks, guidelines, and regulatory systems have often been implemented on a “piece-by-piece” basis in response to the demands or urgent needs of the moment. Ideally, a biosafety system would be developed from a comprehensive plan. However, building such a system and making it operational is complicated by the fact that there is no single best approach nor standard that reflects national environmental, cultural, political, financial, and scientific heterogeneity.