Center for International Development at Harvard University (CID)

Only One Side Of The Risk Equation

The precautionary principle is increasingly being invoked as an approach that governments should embrace to deal with risks, especially environmental and health risks arising from new technology or new products. However, the precautionary principle biases the process of "decision-making under uncertainty" against the new. It is arbitrary, does not compare risks, and addresses only the risk of innovation, not the risk of stagnation. First formalized in the World Charter for Nature, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1982, the precautionary principle was subsequently included in other international agreements, most notably in the Rio Declaration during the UN Conference on Environment and Development in 1992, Principle 15.

Essentially, this approach embodies a concept that, at first glance, sounds sensible: Shouldnt governments take action to protect human health and the environment even when there is no conclusive evidence of harm? However, some governments, such as the European Commission (EC), have taken this principle further in some instances and have insisted that, when scientific evidence "is not black and white, policy should err on the side of caution so that there is zero risk to the consumer" (Report, European Commissions Scientific Committee on Veterinary Measures Relating to Public Health, Brussels, April 1999.)

Although the EC in a more recent communication on the precautionary principle (Commission of the European Communities, Communication from the Commission on the Precautionary Principle, Brussels: February 2, 2000) has backed away from that zero-risk endorsement, implementation of the principle readily leads to an approach that attempts the impossible task of eliminating risk. Furthermore, the precautionary principle can never be satisfied as long as an inventive alarmist can think of yet one more hypothesis about a possible risk that has not yet been absolutely proven not to exist.

The precautionary principle as used in the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (January 29, 2000) states that even when there is a lack of scientific evidence that products produced through biotechnology are likely to cause harm, a country can take action to ban the import of those products. The Protocol, by invoking the precautionary principle in its Preamble and several other specific references, thus enshrines it as a key principle in the agreement.

That explicit and repeated reference to the precautionary principle in the Protocol did not go unnoticed. Less than a week after it had been agreed to, the EC Communication on the precautionary principle was released and noted that the Protocol "confirmed the key function of the Precautionary Principle," and that the principle "has been progressively consolidated in international law, and so it has since become a full-fledged and general principle of international law."

Proponents of the precautionary principle want to err on the side of "caution," but that bias ignores the fact that caution may instead mandate innovation. Focusing on the risks of the new, they ignore the off-setting risks that food shortages might become severe, that existing vaccines might become ineffective, even when the evidence on these risks is not conclusive. The precautionary principle is a one-way ratchet. It obsesses about imagined or potential risks of new technology or innovations while ignoring the real risks on the other side, the risks of restricting the development of technology. No action or activity is risk-free. Biotechnology, as does any new technology, creates some new risks while reducing older risks. Both have to be considered and evaluated the risks of change have to be balanced against the risks of stagnation. Generally, new technologies have reduced overall risk, and that fact is ignored in the precautionary principle and its use in the Cartagena Protocol.

In the case of biotechnology, the risks of technology restrictions will be borne not by the affluent in the developed world, but by people in developing countries, where the human and environmental benefits of agricultural biotechnology could be dramatic and widespread. Higher crop yields per acre not only can provide larger food output to feed the worlds hungry, but also help preserve forests and habitats.. Pesticide reductions made possible by bioengineering resistance into the plants can enhance the environment. The ability to grow crops in inhospitable soils can help keep pace with the needs of growing populations. Enhanced nutritional levels of staple crops, such as rice, can prevent diseases that are life-threatening or debilitating. Possible reduction of allergens in certain foods can lower health risks to many people.

Undoubtedly, safety issues related to specific crops or foods will be raised, and those risks should be carefully examined. However, those risks must be offset against the very real risks to which many in the world are already exposed. The rote application of the precautionary principle, with its strong bias against innovation, to broad classes of biotech products creates high risks that extraordinarily useful products will be suppressed in exchange for no gain in safety.

Reference Excerpted and revised from The Biosafety Protocol: The Real Losers are Developing Countries, Washington, D.C.: National Legal Center for the Public Interest, March 2000.

Copyright 2000 Center for International Development at Harvard University (CID) All Rights Reserved