Overly complex regulation of genetically engineered crops a monstrosity

Government regulation has run amok and threatens advances in agriculture.

USDA’s unscientific, overly complex regulation of genetically engineered crops is a historical fluke, which is an anomaly that originated more than a quarter century ago.

dating from the 1980s, there has been a broad consensus in the scientific community (which has been reflected in statements of federal government policy) that the newest techniques of genetic modification are essentially an extension, or refinement, of older, less precise and less predictable ones, and that oversight should focus on the characteristics of products, not on process.

However, intent on building a regulatory empire, USDA heeded neither the consensus of the scientific community nor the directives from the White House. The resulting unscientific, stultifying regulation has inhibited research and development, particularly in public institutions, ever since, and has provided an endless source of all manner of mischief, including superfluous, obstructive government bureaucracies; wasteful spending on poorly-conceived risk-assessment research; vandalism of field trials; bad-faith legal harassment; and endless nattering by the ill-informed and the ideological.

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