Timing of approval of biotech crops in different countries has big impact on innovation

Because of significant differences in the institutional arrangements, regulatory procedures, administrative capacity, and attitudes toward biotech crops, the amount of time required to complete the review of new biotech events varies significantly from one country to another. This has led to asynchrony in the approval of new biotech crops in countries around the world, which has increased over the last ten years. Coupled with a nearly universal policy of zero tolerance for unapproved events, the stage has been set for chronic and disruptive LLP incidents [The primary risk under such asynchrony that small amounts of grain with biotech events approved in an exporting country but not in an importing one, known as low-level presence (LLP).] Experience with recent LLP incidents has affirmed that they can cause abrupt, large-scale trade disruptions, sustained changes in international trade patterns, and significant economic losses that are borne by both importers and exporters. There is also some evidence that regulatory asynchrony and LLP can cause delays in the implementation of existing innovations and hinder the development of future ones. Such impacts are generally less immediately apparent but potentially far more costly and sustained.