4th Global Conference
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Tuesday 5th July - Thursday 7th
July 2005
Mansfield College, Oxford
Session 8A: Regulation and Autonomy
Chair: James Hazelton
Regulation of Treating with GMO’s in Transition
Countries
Dzvenyslava
Kachur
National University “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy”,
Ukraine
Post Soviet Countries are going through the transition
stage and are extremely sensitive to new technology, economics or social
changes and globalization processes. That is why decision-making and
system of regulation of the use of GMO’s are very sensitive to
number of factors. To analyze them, three levels of factors the most
influential to decision-making can
be identified: global, regional and local.
Global level depends on
external policy of leaders of GMO regulations. USA and EU have the biggest
influence on transition countries, though their positions completely differ.
As USA was leader in inventing GMOs, it is lobbing newly created biotechnological
industry. In EU and other European countries lobbing of biotechnological
industry was not as strong as in USA. Thus, their National law is stricter.
World Trade Organization and International Agreements are also part of
Global level.
Regional level. Geographical position of country is also very
important because every regulation system depends a lot on regulation that
is implemented in neighboring countries. Countries do not exist in vacuum;
they are linked territorially, politically, economically and socially with
neighboring states.
Regulation systems of the transition countries in the
Eastern Europe can be divided into 3 types: those who have no system of
regulation of GMO (Belarus, Romania, Hungary and Ukraine); who approved
some variety that are treated as safe to the market (Poland, Moldavia and
Georgia) and who approved all of the GMOs (Bulgaria, Croatia and Russia
[before 2004]). But even if a country declares not to use GMO it is rather
difficult to control import of such products, because of the lack of the
testing laboratories, corruption of the state employees, agreements on
intellectual property, and institutional country problems.
In spite of global
and regional tendency of GMOs related regulation the most important part
is the local level, namely the national regulation system. Depending on
national level we are choosing priorities at higher levels. As an example
of Post Soviet Countries Ukraine is taken, as Ukraine is one of the largest
countries and one of the biggest exporters of agricultural products in
Europe. Research includes the analysis of attitude
to GM product, their potential risks and benefits of three categories
that influence decision-making the most: farmers, GM experts and Non-Governmental
Organizations.
Autonomy and Risk: Criteria for Proof of Harm in
International Trade
Lotte
Asveld
Department of Philosophy, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
The
US recently accused the European Union of erecting illegitimate trade
barriers for Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO’s). This
accusation refers the EU’s moratorium on the import of GMO’s.
Underlying this transatlantic clash are diverging conceptions of autonomy
and how it ought to be respected. The tension exists between a neo-liberal
concept of autonomy (US) and one that can be linked to politics of
identity (EU). These diverging concepts are likewise reflected in the
policies on risks of international bodies such as the World Trade Organization
(WTO) and United Nations (UN).
Autonomy in this context relates to the
sovereignty of individual countries. However, these concepts may be
applied in other contexts to other actors as well and are relevant
for many disputes on the acceptability of risks.
The WTO propagates the
neo-liberal doctrine of free-trade which prescribes that barriers to
trade should be eliminated where possible to allow every party equal
access to potential markets. Countries may take protective measures against
the import of a given product, but only if they provide proof of harm
to the environment or public health which is based on scientifically
sound evidence.
In contrast, the UN has issued a political agreement related
to trade in GMO’s: the Cartegena Protocol on Biosafety (CBP), which
allows parties to take recourse to the Precautionary Principle (PP).
The PP implies that countries can take protective measures even if the
scientific evidence is inconclusive, thereby setting less strict criteria
for proof of harm.
This paper examines how the different views on autonomy
shape the above-mentioned policies on risk and furthermore asks whether
they are ethically tenable, taking into account some qualities of knowledge
on risks, distribution of resources for generating scientific knowledge
in a globalizing world, and the relation between autonomy and identity.
