IOBC-WPRS

Keywords

risk assessment, biological control, IPM, monitoring, Bacillus thuringiensis, resistance management

Steering Committee

Ramon Albajes, Detlef Bartsch (Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety, Germany), Franz Bigler, Alan Raybould (Syngenta, UK)

Structure and Activity

The group comprises over 100 participants representing scientists of public research institutions, industry and regulatory agencies. The aim is to organize workshops at 1.5 to 2 years intervals. In addition different activities in small subgroups are in preparation.

Aim

Genetically modified (GM) crops are grown commercially on steadily increasing areas worldwide. The two traits that have been commercialized today are insect resistance through the expression of cry genes derived from the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt-crops) and herbicide tolerance (HT crops). The sustainable deployment of these GM crops and their potential environmental impact is hotly discussed both within the scientific community as well as in the public. The working group aims to provide a platform for open discussions among the different parties involved, namely public sector scientist, industry scientist, regulators, decision makers and NGOs.

Below are the objectives of the WG as they have been set at the kick-off meeting at which the WG was established (see Profile 34):

1. Exchange and dissemination of scientific knowledge on the ecological impact of genetically modified organisms
2. Evaluate the compatibility and integration of genetically modified organisms with biological control and IPM
3. Resistance management of the target organisms
4. Development and harmonisation of methods for testing the ecological impact of genetically modified organisms

Activities

Since the establishment of the WG in 2003, five full working group meetings on the "Ecological Impact of Genetically Modified Organisms" (EIGMO) have been organized. The first meeting was held in Prague from November 26-29, 2003. One of the aims was to identify questions that should be addressed by the WG in the future. To identify future areas of research and WG activities, 6 half-day long workshops on different subjects were organized. Reports of these workshops are included in the proceedings from the meeting (IOBC-WPRS Bulletin 27(3), 2004). The second meeting took place from June 1-3 in Lleida, Spain. Contributions from this meeting were published in the IOBC-WPRS Bulletin 29(5), 2006. The third meeting was organized in Warsaw, Poland, from May 23-25, 2007. The proceedings were published in the IOBC-WPRS Bulletin 33, 2008. The forth meeting was organized in Rostock, Germany, from May 14-16, 2009 (see group picture below). The proceedings were published in the IOBC-WPRS Bulletin 52, 2010.

(Click to enlarge the picture.)

The last full working group meeting was organized by the Biology Centre of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic in České Budějovice from June 22-25, 2011. The program and abstracts can be downloaded here. The proceedings of this meeting are currently prepared.

Special WG Activities

Non-target risk-assessment and regulation At the second WG meeting in Lleida in 2006, a satellite workshop on non-target risk assessment and regulation was organized. The workshop was attended by participants from public research institutes, industry and regulatory authorities. The participants were invited based on their experience in (GMO) risk assessment and regulation. The aim of the workshop was to identify areas where members of the WG could facilitate the development of guidelines related to non-target risk assessment of insecticidal GM crops. This need had been identified in the workshop hold at the previous WG meeting in Prague (Romeis, 2004, pdf, IOBC wprs Bulletin Vol. 27 (3) 2004, pp.193-195).
The following three focus areas were identified at the workshop:
(i) Development of a generic risk assessment process for non-target organisms
(ii) Definition of criteria for the selection of non-target organisms to be assessed
(iii) Development of standard test methods for selected non-target species
A workshop protocol with a list of participants has been included in the proceedings from the Lleida meeting (Romeis, 2006, pdf, IOBC-WPRS Bulletin 29(5) 2006, pp. 197-200).
Shortly after the workshop, an expert group was established and the initiative on "Non-target risk-assessment and regulation" was formally accepted by the IOBC-WPRS Executive Committee in December 2005. The expert group involved scientists from diverse institutions including public research institutes, the agricultural biotechnology industry, regulatory agencies, and a commercial testing laboratory. Participants were selected based on their experience in the application of tiered risk assessment from a research and regulatory perspective. This group met for an expert workshop in Engelberg, Switzerland in May 2006. The outcome was a generic, rigorous and pragmatic non-target risk assessment framework for insect-resistant GM crops that can be adopted by different countries after adaptation to their specific regulatory needs and local circumstances.
The developed non-target risk assessment approach was for the first time presented later in 2006 at the 9th International Symposium on the Biosafety of Genetically Modified Organisms organized by the International Society for Biosafety Research (http://www.isbr.info/) in Jeju, South Korea (Romeis et al., 2006, pdf).
In June 2007, J. Romeis was invited to present the approach at the EFSA Scientific Colloquium on "Environmental risk Assessment of genetically Modified Plants – Challenges and Approaches" in Tabiano, Italy (http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/science/colloquium_series/Colloquium_8_gmo.html)

The approach finally got published in January 2008 in Nature Biotechnology (Romeis et al., 2008; http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v26/n2/pdf/nbt1381.pdf). Short versions are also published in newsletters such as the ISB News Report (Romeis, 2008, pdf) and the newsletter from ABSP II (Shelton & Romeis, 2008, pdf). In addition, details of the approach were presented in an interview on www.GMO-safety.eu (http://www.gmo-safety.eu/en/maize/bt-concept/525.docu.html).

The proposed risk assessment approach was presented in a set of talks at the next full WG meeting in Warsaw in 2007. The presentations were followed by an open plenum discussion. The protocol of the discussion is included in the proceedings from the Warsaw meeting (Schulte, 2008, pdf, IOBC wprs Bulletin Vol. 33, 2008 pp. 157-158).

The risk assessment approach has been presented at a side event co-organized with PBS (Program for Biosafety Systems, http://www.ifpri.org/pbs/pbs.asp) during the MOP4 (Fourth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity Serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, http://www.cbd.int/biosafety) meeting in Bonn, Germany in May 2008. For this occasion also a flyer (pdf) has been developed. Following a general presentation of the proposed risk assessment approach, Bonifacio F. Cayabyab from the University of the Philippines Los Baños presented a case-study where the approach was successfully applied to assess the non-target risks of Bt maize in The Philippines. The side-event was well attended and also attracted some official country delegates.

In early 2011 a paper was published (Romeis et al. 2011, pdf) that aims at providing guidance and recommendations on experimental design for early tier laboratory studies used to evaluate potential adverse effects of arthropod-resistant GE plants on NTAs. The paper is the outcome of expert panels convened by the WG and the Center for Environmental Risk Assessment (CERA) of the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) Research Foundation. These principles of laboratory study design were addressed in a workshop co-organized with CERA at the 11th International Symposium on the Biosafety of Genetically Modified Organisms (ISBGMO), on November 19, 2010 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The program of the workshop can be found here (pdf). For this occasion also a flyer (pdf) has been developed.

Achievements

IOBC-WPRS Bulletin Vol. 29 (5), 2006, (pdf, restricted for members), 200 pp., table of contents (pdf)
IOBC-WPRS Bulletin Vol. 33, 2008 (pdf, restricted for members), 158 pp., table of contents and abstracts (pdf)
IOBC-WPRS Bulletin Vol. 52, 2010 (pdf, restricted for members), 117 pp., table of contents and abstracts (pdf)
IOBC-WPRS Bulletin Vol. 73, 2012 (pdf, restricted for members), 134 pp., table of contents and abstracts (pdf)

Romeis J, Bartsch D, Bigler F, Candolfi MP, Gielkens MMC, Hartley SE, Hellmich RL, Huesing JE, Jepson PC, Layton R, Quemada H, Raybould A, Rose RI, Schiemann J, Sears MK, Shelton AM, Sweet J, Vaituzis Z & Wolt JD (2006). Moving through the tiered and methodological framework for non-target arthropod risk assessment of transgenic insecticidal crops. Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on the Biosafety of Genetically Modified Organisms, 24-29 September 2006, Jeju Island, South Korea, 62-67. (Romeis et al., 2006, pdf)

Romeis J (2006). Working group GMOs in Integrated Plant Production (2001-present). In: International Organization for Biological Control for Noxious Animals and Plants (IOBC). Boller EF, van Lenteren JC & Delucchi V (Eds). History of the first 50 years (1956-2006), 267-268.

Romeis J, Bartsch D, Bigler F, Candolfi MP, Gielkens MMC, Hartley SE, Hellmich RL, Huesing JE, Jepson PC, Layton R, Quemada H, Raybould A, Rose RI, Schiemann J, Sears MK, Shelton AM, Sweet J, Vaituzis Z & Wolt JD (2008). Assessment of risk of insect-resistant transgenic crops to nontarget arthropods. Nature Biotechnology 26, 203-208. http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v26/n2/abs/nbt1381.html

Romeis J (2008). Harmonizing the non-target risk assessment for GM crops. ISB News Report, June, pp. 2-5. (Romeis, 2008, pdf)

Shelton AM & Romeis J (2008). Recent perspectives on risk assessment. ABSP II Newsletter, April 2008, 3(2), 2-3. (Shelton & Romeis, 2008, pdf)

Romeis J, McLean MA (2011) Improving design quality of early-tier non-target arthropod studies. ISB News Report, June 2011, pp. 6-8. (Romeis & McLean, 2011, pdf)

Romeis J, Hellmich RL, Candolfi MP, Carstens K, De Schrijver A, Gatehouse AMR, Herman RA, Huesing JE, McLean MA, Raybould A, Shelton AM, Waggoner A (2011) Recommendations for the design of laboratory studies on non-target arthropods for risk assessment of genetically engineered plants. Transgenic Research 20, 1-22. (Romeis et al. 2011, pdf)