Argentina`s Years of Experience in Gene Editing Regulation

While many countries are still deliberating about regulating products of new breeding techniques, Argentina has now accumulated four years of experience in implementing a pioneer regulation for NBT products. Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology released an article with an analysis of the effects on economic innovation of such regulations.

Argentina's regulatory system for modern agricultural biotechnology products is recognized for being one of the most experienced ones. In 2015, the country enacted a regulation for NBT products. Universidad de Buenos Aires researchers and partners compared the cases of NBT products against the cases of GM products approved in Argentina. The results showed that NBT products have a faster development rate from bench to market, which is primarily driven by a diverse group of developers including small end medium enterprises and public research institutions. Furthermore, product profiles of NBT products are more diverse in terms of traits and organisms.

Read more findings in Frontiers.

Figure: The timeline of GMO approvals in Argentina and the determination of conventional or GMO status for products obtained using different NBTs. The horizontal axis represents the year of the regulatory decision, and the vertical axis represents the number of products.