BIOTECH TRAIT APPROVALS AND COEXISTENCE

ASA Position

ASA supports timely deregulation of new biotech traits by APHIS based solely on sound science. Regarding the coexistence of biotech, conventional, and organic crops, ASA will participate in efforts to identify and resolve any issues through the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on 21st Century Agriculture and other private sector efforts.

Background

Before 2005, deregulation of new biotech traits by APHIS and EPA required an average of 18 months. Under the Coordinated Framework established in 1989, APHIS’s decision to deregulate is based on whether the trait poses a plant pest risk under the Plant Variety Protection Act, which has usually entailed conducting an Environmental Assessment. In 2005, a lawsuit filed by the Center for Food Safety alleged that, in deregulating glyphosate tolerant alfalfa, APHIS failed to consider the possible economic impact of out-crossing on neighboring organic or conventional alfalfa producers, as provided for under the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA). A judge in the 9th Circuit Court ruled in favor of the complainant and ordered GT alfalfa plantings suspended pending completion of a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) by APHIS. This ruling was followed by a similar decision by the same Circuit Court on APHIS deregulation of biotech sugar beets. Pending the outcome of these EIS’s, the approval process at APHIS for new biotech traits, including soybeans, lengthened to an average of 40 months.

As APHIS neared completion of the EIS on GT alfalfa, Secretary Vilsack initiated a series of meetings between biotech, conventional, and organic alfalfa growers and industry in an effort to find common ground for the coexistence of these crops. The position of biotech producers and industry is that coexistence works when all parties cooperate in the use of setbacks, staggered planting schedules, and other practices that prevent out-crossing. Some in the organic industry continued to oppose deregulation of biotech alfalfa, while others supported USDA’s eventual decision to incorporate and require crop management practices in the final EIS. ASA and other biotech supporters raised serious concerns about the introduction of non-science-based criteria in the deregulation process. These concerns included setting a precedent for deregulation of all biotech traits, and the impact which introducing economic criteria for deregulation would have on U.S. efforts to confront unscientific restrictions on biotech approvals by other countries.

After a public forum held by the House Agriculture Committee, Secretary Vilsack decided to fully deregulate GT alfalfa and biotech sugar beets, and announced that USDA would address coexistence issues through the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on 21st Century Agriculture. ASA President Alan Kemper is a member of the Committee, which met in 2011 and again in March 2012.