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Leveling The Playing Field In Gmo Risk Assessment: Importers, Exporters And The Limits Of Science, Alison Peck

Alison Peck

The WTO system requires that trade restrictions to protect health and safety be based on a risk assessment supported by “sufficient scientific evidence.” Scholars and international standards organizations have pointed out, however, that science is not capable of providing answers to questions of health and safety without incorporation of value judgments and assumptions by the risk assessors. Before GMO-importing countries conduct risk assessments, GMO-producing and -exporting countries have already conducted separate risk assessments that led to the decision to produce and market the products in the first place. Both risk assessments – of exporting and importing countries – employ science …