Will Biden 'Follow the Science' on Regulatory Reform?

This year marks the 35th anniversary of the US Coordinated Framework for the Regulation of Biotechnology, a blueprint for federal agencies’ oversight of genetic engineering that was prepared by the White House and published by its Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Early on, it was recognized that the agencies’ regulatory scope was overly broad, so reforms were added in the 1992 follow-on OSTP ‘Scope Document’ to create more narrowly targeted, risk-based oversight. However, those important changes were never implemented. The OSTP now has a perfect opportunity for President Biden to make good on his repeated promises to “always follow the science,” by directing federal agencies to incorporate the Scope Document’s principles into practice, thereby reducing the costly over-regulation that is stifling many of the important benefits of agricultural biotechnology. Read Full Article »