Forum discussions

The first guiding question for theme 3 is “What methods have been used to assess the possible socio-economic impacts of living modified organisms?”

Important to point out that issues, methods and when the analysis is conducted; are intricately interconnected. The issues will determine the methods to be used, which in turn will be limited by when the assessment is conducted within the regulatory system. If the assessment is conducted before deliberate release (ex ante) there is no adoption to measure and thus no data can be collected on adopters. This will reduce the portfolio of methods that can be used for the socio-economic assessment.

If the assessment is done after deliberate release (ex post) then issue is designing appropriate data collection approaches that explicitly consider avoiding sampling and statistical bias. Note that practitioners can and have used survey data collected on the current producers using existing technologies in order to project potential benefits and all available secondary data.

Here it is critical to clearly differentiate between a baseline and a counterfactual. A baseline is a state of nature measured before the intervention by which to compare the state of nature after the intervention. In contrast, a counterfactual is that state of nature that would have happened without the intervention.

In social and economic analysis, we do not have the luxury of controlled experiments  -although significant progress have been made in terms of using quasi-experimental approaches such as difference in difference approaches- by which to isolate the treatment from other confounding factors.

Most economist prefer using a counterfactual because social and economic baselines have the severe limitation that other external factors may also take a role in explaining the observed state of nature with the intervention. Issue is then usually selecting or constructing a counterfactual as it is not observed in practice.
Here is a very partial list of methods that have been used for economic based studies. In a separate message I will post a partial list of methods that have/could be used for broader social, anthropological, cultural,  and ethical assessments.

Farmers/households
• Partial budget/accounting
• Econometric/statistical estimations
• Damage abatement

Consumers
• Willingness to Pay (WTP)
• Changes in consumer perceptions
• Impact on health
   o Daily Life Year Adjusted (DALYs) lost
   o Use of consumption patterns to project changes in fortified foods

Sector
• Economic surplus
• Stochastic economic surplus
• Real options
• Damage abatement
• Partial budgeting
• Stochastic partial budgeting
• Linear and non-linear programming methods
• Stochastic simulations
• Farmer decision models (lexicographic learning approaches)
• Applied Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) models – village, region, national and regional levels

Trade
• Trade models using GTAP (Generalized Trade Analysis Project)
• Applied CGE models
• Partial budget
• Partial equilibrium / economic surplus models

Let me introduce myself. My name is Michelle Chauvet. I am a professor-researcher of the Sociology Department at the Autonomous Metropolitan University, campus Azcapotzalco in Mexico, City. In 2004, I participated in the study of the Commission of Environmental Cooperation CEC. “Maize and Biodiversity. The Effects of Transgenic Maize in Mexico” with two chapters, one with Steve Brush about the social issues and other with Jorge Larson about participation and communications with communities. In 2008, with Amanda Galvez an annotated bibliography about the socioeconomic impacts was made for the Secretariat of the Cartagena Protocol and a workshop was held in Mexico City as José Falck-Zepeda mentioned.

In the Sociology Department at the Autonomous Metropolitan University, campus Azcapotzalco in Mexico, City, I am the coordinator of a research area named “Social Impacts of Biotechnology in agriculture and environment”. We are mainly focused on the real impacts of biotechnology over the potential ones. So, we did ex-post analysis in the following issues: flowers, milk production (rBST), sugar cane and Bt Cotton. Also, an  ex- ante analysis has been made in potato, papaya, maize (accidental release). Most publications are in Spanish; however, at the end of these lines, you’ll find the references for some documents that are in English.

For those studies, in the relevant region of each case, we analyzed several issues as employment, cost-benefit analysis, technological decision-making processes, relationships with institutions, cultural practices linked to natural resources, and so on. The methods are those relating to sociological and anthropological fields of work like interviews, surveys, focus groups, ethnographic tools and social network analysis. Economic models were not used. In addition, we are interested in monitoring findings, because we are aware that the socioeconomic effects are dynamic and are not given once and forever. For example, in the case of milk production with rBST, we returned ten years later to the farmers we visited, in order to give follow up to the impacts.

References
Silva-Rosales, L.; González -de-León and Chauvet, M. (2010) Why there is no Transgenic Papaya in Mexico. Transgenic Plant Journal . Transgenic Papaya, Volume 4 Special Issue 1 (pp 45-51).
http://www.globalsciencebooks.info/JournalsSup/10TPJ_4_SI1.html

Chauvet, M., Galvez, A. (2008) An Annotated Bibliography of existing studies on socio-economic impacts of modern biotechnologies. Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity


Chauvet, M., Ochoa, R. (1996) “An appraisal of the use of rBST in Mexico”, Biotechonology and Development Monitor, No. 27, Holanda , june. Pp.. 6 y 7.

ON BEHALF OF KOFFY DANTSEY

De: Koffi DANTSEY <koffidantsey@yahoo.fr>
Date: Mercredi 13 avril 2011, 20h43

First of all, I would like to thank CBD secretariat for allowing me to participe in the second round of discussion. 

[...]

Literature collected many years of research and writing on biosafety shown that methods have been used to access the possible socio-economic impacts can be grouped into :

- Economic model (General Algebric Modeling system differentiation  of prices, output price and endogenous models)... etc

- Budget level ranch(farm)/survey/interview.

- Analisis perfomance and economic data.

- Analysis with framework of social sciences((social, cultural, ethical..)

- Comments/anecdoctes

- Participatory Research ( public debate, rural appracial, citizen juries).

Potential Issues, Methods and Approaches
In a meeting organized by the Biosafety Unit at the UNEP-GEF and the CBD Secretariat, a panel of expets including Rosa Luz Gonzalez Aguirre (UAM-Mexico), Michelle Chauvet-Sanchez (UAM-Mexico), Elena Lazos Chavero (UNAM-Mexico), Amanda Gálvez Mariscal (UNAM-Mexico), Anthony La Vina (Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines), Jose Falck Zepeda (IFPRI), amongst others (my deepest apologies if I have forgotten anybody),  compiled an extensive (but still partial) list of potential methods and approaches that could be used to the potential assessment of socio-economic considerations.

Note that this list is actually a mix of qualitative and/or quantitative list of data collection, assessment and analysis methods and approaches.

The next step would be a mapping of the methods/approaches to the issues and a clear identification of feasibility, data requirements, limitations, costs and benefits for all of the elements in this list. This would provide quite useful information for countries to decide upon the framework and the implementation of socio-economic considerations.

The present list should not be understood as a check list, a list of steps that have to be met to conduct a socio-economic assessment. This list should be understood as a portfolio of methods from which countries, decision makers and practitioners may pick and choose for potential use in their deliberations. This leads us to the next step which is how to integrate the result s from the socio-economic assessment into a decision making process currently being discussed in another thread.

Economic Cost/Benefit and Models

Identification of stakeholders  (Social Network Analysis)
Microeconomic models (household, community)
Global and/or economy wide models (CGE)
Policy analysis
Social Accounting Matrixes (SAM)
Systemic Relevance Assessment (SRA)

Social Impact Assessment

Identification of stakeholders (Social Network Analysis)
Demographic Analysis
Social Returns on Investment (RSOI)
Rapid Rural Development Appraisal
Poverty and Social Impact Assessment (PSIA)
Policy analysis
Theory of Change
Health and safety
Gender and generational
Mitigation Measures
Conflict / violence resolution
Systemic Relevance Assessment  (SRA)


Sustainable Livelihoods Framework

Traditional knowledge – Inventory & Diagnostic
Traditional knowledge – Theory of Change
Sacred sites
Customary law and protocols
Community institutions and regulations
Cultural heritage impact assessment
Rituals, ceremonies , myths and community festivities
Gender and generational analysis
Conflict / violence resolution

Participatory Research

Town Meetings Jury Citizens
Consensus Conference
Deliberate Polling
DELPHI Expert /Leader  Panel
Focus Groups
Technology Festival
Scenario Building Exercise

Meeting was held in Mexico City in 2008.

Dear all,

This is a challenging question due to the different approaches and the complexity of SEC.

As pointed out by Armin Spoek: The lack of socioeconomic information in the dossiers is a particular problem. With regard to scientific journals there is also very little published on SECs.

There is as pointed out in this discussion group different publications on the economics involved. There have also been published studies that also include the social and / or ecological issues from Mexico (see contribution from Michelle Chauvet), USA (see Benbrook and Jorge Fernandez-Cornejo et al.), South-Africa (Goouse et al.). One important reflection from these studies is that they all provide different approaches and methods. These studies also show that SEC need to be multidimensional. The critics posted in these discussions to some of these studies are also relevant as input to how previous methods can be further developed.

I would like to acknowlegde the excellent overview by Dr. Jose Falck Zepeda which gives an overview of methods that are of high importance for assessment of SEC.

Moreover, I would like to share with you some thoughts:

1. SEC may be quite different for large-scale agriculture and small-scale agriculture. For small-acale agriculture the IAASTD framework can give a good starting point for development of a guidance for assessing impacts and for hence methods (also pointed out here by Lin)

2.Georgina Catacora points out three important aspects; existence, distribution and persistence, that is important to consider. Accordingly methods developed for other products than LMOs as life-cycle assessment or value-chain assessment can provide good methodological frameworks that can be further developed and refined for LMOs.

3. Further development of public participation and involvement(as consultation, farmers questionnaires, interviews, workshops) need to be acknowlegded as these are also important methods for SEC.

Dear all,



Many thanks for the different lists of existing methodologies to assess
social and economic impacts. However, we find these lists rather
overwhelming particularly the ones focus on pure economic assessment. We
wonder if all the methodologies listed have been used to assess the possible
socio-economic impacts of LMOs? As far as we know, they have not. On the
contrary, the majority of the research has focused on economic assessments,
only.



We think that we need to be cautious in the selection of the methods to be
used in SE assessments related to LMOs. Not to forget the SOCIAL component
is crucial. And without jeopardizing the quality of the research, apply a
feasible methodological pluralism that balances quantitative and qualitative
research methods and methodologies. Public participation in SE assessment is
particularly important.



In relation to LM crops, we think it is important to review existing
relevant assessments, such as IAASTD (http://www.agassessment.org), to get useful
insights on the conceptual framework and methods used for carrying out
assessment based on secondary sources of information.



Many thanks,



Georgina Catacora-V.