Among the last-minute Clinton administration biotechnology-policy gestures, the would-be “final” rule from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA; Washington, DC) under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) may not be the most important. But, more than most others, it typifies the manic spirit of this politically charged transition period. The FIFRA rule has been pending for so many years that only devoted insiders were keeping track of its chances for completion (Nat. Biotechnol. 18, 486, 2000). Meanwhile, since 1994, agency officials have been using its working precepts to evaluate genetically engineered “pesticides,” mainly those containing genes encoding the Bacillus thuringiensis-derived insecticide, that now are produced by several crops. The rule, which largely formalizes EPA's existing process, would involve no substantive change in the way Bt products are reviewed.
On Clinton's final day in office, EPA officials sent the final version of the FIFRA rule for publication in the Federal Register. However, the printing queue was jammed with plenty of other would-be final rules, providing the new Bush administration with an opportunity to yank the ill-fated rule once again. Whether Bush's chosen EPA Administrator, former New Jersey governor Christine Whitman, will relent on the FIFRA rule is still anybody's guess.
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