Poverty reduction, Agricultural research, Environmental protection, Genetically modified organisms, Crops, Agricultural biotechnology Research, Investments, Strategic Environmental Assessment,

Birner, Regina

Falck-Zepeda, Jose

Gaskell, Joanne

Halsey, Mark

Linacre, Nicholas A.

Quemada, Hector

Rosegrant, Mark W.

English

Research Papers in Economics

INTERNATIONAL FOOD
POLICy RESEARCH INSTITUTE
sustainable solutions for ending hunger and poverty
strateGIc envIronMental assessMent strateGIc strateGIc
Nicholas A. Linacre, Joanne Gaskell, Mark W. Rosegrant, 
Jose Falck-Zepeda, Hector Quemada, Mark Halsey, and Regina Birner
Assessing the Environmental Impact of BiotechnologyProject-based risk assessments or Environmental Impact 
Assessments (EIAs) of biotechnology are used to evaluate 
specific developments when the technology is ready 
for commercialization, but there is a need to develop 
comprehensive analyses of plans at an earlier stage of 
development to justify the investment of potentially large 
amounts of public monies in specific biotechnologies. This 
provides the rationale for the use of SEA in development-
related investments to integrate environmental considerations 
with poverty alleviation potential, gender and other social 
issues that may impact the choice of crop and trait, and 
governance and legal factors. This would be done at the 
planning level when alternative biotechnology options are 
under consideration. However, few attempts have been made to 
define how an SEA process for biotechnology would work. The 
purpose of this policy brief is to start to map out a process for 
undertaking such assessments. Comprehensive analyses also 
consider the impacts of not approving novel products.
The SEA methodology is set out in Figure 1 and includes 
qualitative and quantitative analysis, management, participation, 
and communication.
  
 
QualItatIve     ANALySIS
D
uring the qualitative assessment stage, evaluators iden-
tify plans and programs that are likely to have significant 
environmental effects and therefore should be subject to 
environmental assessment. At this stage, expert opinion and 
stakeholder consultation are used to identify potential objec-
tives, alternatives, and impacts (Figure 1). Broadly, the qualitative 
analysis considers the identification of objectives (e.g., those 
established by legislation and those established by stakeholder 
consultation), the identification of a set of technology alterna-
tives, and an assessment of alternatives in light of the objectives. 
For example, expert panels could use decision support methods 
such as the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), Multi Attribute 
Utility Theory (MAUT), or other multi-criteria techniques to 
assess alternative policy options against established objectives. 
The aim of multi-stakeholder and group decision approaches is 
to identify and develop consensus around preferred investment 
options.
      The key benefits of these approaches are:
aligning investment decisions with objectives  
  or goals; 
implementing a structured, methodologically    
  repeatable, relatively low-cost, and rapid decision- 
  making approach; 
leveraging local, regional, and global expertise; 
improving communication; and 
building consensus.  
 
QuantItatIve     ANALySIS
E
valuators may or may not proceed with quantitative analy-
sis depending on the results of the qualitative assessment. 
However, quantitative analysis may be used to provide rigorous 
support for the qualitative assessment, which is based primar-
ily on expert opinion and consultation with stakeholders and 
the community.  At this stage, specific data requirements and 
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M
eeting the food needs of the world’s growing population while reducing pov-
erty and protecting the environment is a major global challenge. Private- and 
public-sector organizations must decide how to spend limited agricultural 
research funds in order to achieve maximum impact with regard to finding 
sustainable solutions to ending hunger and poverty. Considerable funds are spent for public 
research with the aim of developing genetically modified (GM) crops that serve the needs 
of the poor. However, past experience with developing new agricultural technologies to 
combat hunger and poverty—for example, the Green Revolution—shows that it is essential 
to take environmental concerns into account in order to develop technological solutions 
that are sustainable in the long run. In order to make commercialization of GM crops pos-
sible, considerable efforts are made to assess the economic and social impact of investment 
in agricultural biotechnology and the establishment of regulatory systems for biosafety in 
developing countries. Yet few attempts have been made to systematically account for envi-
ronmental issues when deciding on plans, programs, and research priorities for GM crops. 
Potentially, Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) could be used to ensure that envi-
ronmental considerations are evaluated in the research and priority-setting process.
2methods must be identified. Typical data requirements for an SEA 
include: information on the crop’s biology and ecology, the gene 
product, and potential land use changes. This information allows 
evaluators to address concerns about potential invasiveness, 
spread, and toxicity.
The quantitative risk assessment literature consistently  
emphasizes the need to rank the magnitude of consequences 
and the probability of those consequences within a given time 
frame. Risk can therefore be viewed as the triplet (si, pi, xi), 
where si is the risk scenario, with each si having a probability 
(pi) of occurring and a consequence (xi) if it occurs. Strategic 
environmental assessment is then the process of identifying the 
risk scenarios, their probabilities, and consequences, and then 
investigating the effect of uncertainty on the probability and 
consequence estimates. We ask the following questions:
What can happen (si)?
How likely is it to happen (pi)?
What are the consequences should the risk  
  scenario (si) occur (xi)?
How confident are we in our estimates of pi and xi?
Typically, decisions are made with incomplete information 
or intrinsic variability, which leads to uncertainty. This uncer-
tainty needs to be incorporated into the analysis in order to 
assess its impact on a decision. There are a number of ways of 
incorporating uncertainty about parameter values and assump-
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The SEA Decision
 
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1. Accept risks 
2. Manage risks*
3. Avoid risks (do not undertake activity)
*Monitoring (a decision to accept or manage may  
 require monitoring).
Management
Qualitative analysis
1. Identification of policy objectives
2. Identification of policy alternatives
3. Assessment of objectives against alternatives
4. Consideration of practicality:
   a. can it be enforced?
   b. does legal authority exist?
5. Implications over short, medium, and long terms:
   a. economic;
   b. environmental; and
    c. social-cultural.
1. Assessment of impacts
2. Characterization of 
  a. risks,
  b. benefits, and 
  c. costs.
3. Uncertainty analysis
Quantitative analysis
Figure 1—a strategic environmental assessment (sea) paradigm for biotechnology plans  
      or programs
Note:  The SEA process involves qualitative and quantitative research assessment methodologies integrated with communication,  
         participation, and management.Copyright © 2005 International Food Policy Research Institute. All rights reserved. Sections of this document may be reproduced without the express permission of, 
but with acknowledgment to, the International Food Policy Research Institute.  For permission to reprint, contact ifpri-copyright@cgiar.org.
Cover photos: left: © stockphoto, top: © 2005 iStockphoto/Radu Razvan, right: © 2005 IFPRI/Klaus von Grebmer, bottom: © 2005 IFPRI/Valerie Rhoe.
InternatIonal Food PolIcy research InstItute
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www.ifpri.org
tions into models to help characterize risk. One useful approach 
is scenario (i.e., what-if) and sensitivity analyses that assess the 
effect of uncertainty simply by altering the parameter values and 
repeating the calculation. 
 
 
ManaGeMent
There are three principal options available for managing risk:
Accept the risk and recognize that a benefit-   
  cost-risk trade-off was made.
Manage or control the level of risk, for example by    
  using confinement strategies and monitoring.
Avoid the risk by not undertaking the activity. 
With biotechnology the potential risks generally can be 
mitigated using risk-management strategies that may make 
some proposed activities acceptable. Measures might include 
isolation distances (distances based on existing information 
from the unmodified crop and the intended genetic modifica-
tion), detasseling or removal of floral parts, bagging of flower-
ing parts, temporal isolation, termination before flowering, 
guard rows/pollen trap rows/wind breaks, and measures to 
prevent seed dispersal from the area. Other measures may be 
appropriate depending on the biology of the unmodified plant, 
the nature by which pollen and seeds are dispersed, and the 
intended genetic modification (the intended phenotype).
PartIcIPatIon AND COMMUNICATION
O
ne of the principles of SEA is that it should be transparent 
and open. In line with this principle, participation is gen-
erally considered to be an essential step in an SEA procedure. 
Participation implies that “sufficient information on the views of 
all legitimate stakeholders (including the affected public) is avail-
able early enough to be used effectively in the preparation of the 
strategic decision” (Dalal-Clayton and Sadler 2004, 15). The prin-
ciples of openness and transparency also require documentation 
that makes the results understandable and available to all parties 
affected by the decision. How the results of the SEA are taken 
1.
2.
3.
into account in decisionmaking should also be communicated to 
the stakeholders.
There are various forms in which public and stakeholder 
participation can be organized in an SEA. Birner and Alcaraz 
(2004) reviewed a number of approaches that have been applied 
in Europe for assessing biotechnology, including small-scale 
citizen juries (Switzerland), a national-level dialogue among 
organized stakeholders (Germany), internet platforms with self-
selected participants followed by conferences (France, EU), and 
large-scale public deliberation (United Kingdom). Stakeholder 
consultation processes on biotechnology have also been orga-
nized for developing countries.
conclusIon
F
ew comprehensive analyses along the lines described here 
appear to exist in the literature. However, if informed deci-
sions about the value of GMOs are to be made, it will be crucial 
to have integrated SEAs using qualitative and quantitative assess-
ments that take into account gene flow, toxicity, decision analysis, 
and uncertainty estimation. We believe that such a process is 
likely to lead to more transparent and defensible decisionmaking 
in international agricultural research.
For Further readInG 
Dalal-Clayton, B., and B. Sadler. 2004. Strategic Environmental Assessment: A 
Sourcebook and Reference Guide to International Experience. London: 
Earthscan, OECD, UNEP, IIED. Online at: www.iied.org/spa/sea.html.
Birner, R., and G. Alcaraz. 2004. Policy Dialogues on Genetically Modified Crops in 
Europe: Insights for African Policy Dialogues on Biotechnology. Background 
paper. Online at www.ifpri.org/africadialogue/pdf/policydialoguespaper.pdf.
Hails, R. S. 2000. Genetically Modified Plants—The Debate Continues. Trends in 
Ecology and Evolution: 15:14–18.
aBout the authors
nicholas a. linacre (n.linacre@cgiar.org) is a postdoctoral fellow at IFPRI; 
Joanne Gaskell (jgaskell@stanford.edu) is a PhD scholar at Stanford University; 
Mark W. rosegrant (m.rosegrant@cgiar.org) is director of the Environment 
and Production Technology Division at IFPRI; Jose Falck-Zepeda (j.falck-
zepeda@cgiar.org) is a research fellow at IFPRI; hector Quemada (hector.
quemada@wmich.edu) is a scientist at Western Michigan University; Mark 
halsey (MHalsey@danforthcenter.org) is a scientist at Donald Danforth Plant 
Science Center; and regina Birner (r.birner@cgiar.org) is a research fellow
at IFPRI.

Strategic environmental assessment: assessing the environmental impact of biotechnology

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Strategic environmental assessment: assessing the environmental impact of biotechnology

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Research Papers in Economics