Risk Policy in USDA. A. S. Ahl, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Risk Assessment and Cost-Benefit Analysis, 1400 Independence Avenue SW, Mail Stop 3811, Washington, D.C. 20250
USDA’s Office of Risk Assessment and Cost-Benefit Analysis (ORACBA) was established by the Federal Crop Insurance Reform and Department of Agriculture Reorganization Act of 1994. ORACBA’s role is to ensure that major regulations proposed by USDA are based on sound scientific and economic analysis. A major regulation has an annual economic impact of at least $100 million annually and affects human health, safety, or the environment. The Reorganization Act provides standards for risk assessment and cost-benefit analysis. They should be based on reasonably obtainable and sound scientific, technical, economic, and other data. The analysis should provide a clear understanding of the hazards being addressed, the probability of their occurrence, the associated level of uncertainty, and the magnitude of the problem should the hazard occur. The costs associated with the proposed regulation and reasonable alternatives should be compared to their benefits, including those related to the reduction or prevention of risk. Where appropriate, a comparison of the risk to other similar risks addressed by USDA programs should be provided. The analysis should communicate to policy officials and the public what is known and not known about the risk.
USDA oversees a wide variety of programs impacting human health, safety, or the environment. Primarily, these include the national forests; conservation programs for farms, safety of meat and poultry; international imports for animals, plants, and their commodities; impact of genetically engineered organisms on the environment. In the two years existence, ORACBA has had an impact in the Department. In addition to the legally mandated review function, ORACBA serves USDA through education and training programs in risk assessment, coordination support and guidance for agencies required to perform risk assessment, and support for risk information sources. This presentation reviews some of the challenges in science and risk policy which ORACBA has encountered in its first two years.