GM-free private standards and their effects on biosafety decision-making in developing countries

Guillaume Gruère and Debdatta Sengupta

No 51334, 2009 Conference, August 16-22, 2009, Beijing, China from International Association of Agricultural Economists

Abstract: We provide a comprehensive review of international cases where GM-free private standards set up by food companies in developed countries have influenced biosafety policymaking in developing countries. We find twenty-nine cases where private importers have directly or indirectly affected policy decisions in twenty-one countries. Most of the cases relate irrational fear of export losses to excessively precautionary decisions. These cases are based on two generally misleading premises: the belief that Europe or Japan represents the only market for exports, and the perception that non-GM segregation is infeasible or prohibitively costly in all situations. Our study also demonstrates the importance of information asymmetries across countries and agents and the role of risk aversion in seemingly irrational decision making. The combination of these four factors helps us explain why presumed but unproven expected commercial losses still represents a significant impediment to biosafety policymaking in developing countries.

Keywords: Agricultural and Food Policy; International Relations/Trade; Political Economy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 15
Date: 2009
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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Journal Article: GM-free private standards and their effects on biosafety decision-making in developing countries (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:iaae09:51334

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.51334

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