Strategic Environmental Assessment [SEA] | Environmental & Social Impact Assessment [ESIA]a [18] | Environmental Risk Assessment [ERA] | |
---|---|---|---|
Purpose | Supports political and policy level decision-making | Supports decision-making on specific projects | Supports decision-making on specific products |
Scope | Policy, plans and programmes | Specific projects | Specific projects |
Legislative basis | National and EU environmental regulations | National and EU environmental regulations | International law and national biosafety legislationb |
Guidance | Extensive documentation, including from WHO [75], UNEP [76, 77], World Bank [78], OECD [79, 80] and EU [81] | Extensive documentation, including from WHO [82], World Bank [78], International Finance Corporation of the World Bank Group [83], African Development Bank Group [84], UNEP [76, 77] and EU [85] | Extensive documentation, including from CBD [11], EFSA [7, 12], NASEM [9] and WHO [8] |
Number of exercises envisaged | Single for a general class of intervention (e.g. low threshold gene drive for malaria control) | Single for a specific release at specific location but likely to be multiple based on specific context and geography | Likely to be multiple, arising from different sponsors and assigned assessors |
Sponsor | Developer | Developer | Developer; Organization independent of developer; Regulatorc |
Assessor | Organization independent of developer | Organization independent of developer | Developer; Organisation independent of developer; Regulatorc |
Extent of engagement | Public facing and participative; Stakeholders engaged throughout processd; Data collection by interviews, focus groups, and desk-based work | Public facing and participative; Stakeholders engaged throughout processd, Data collection by interviews, focus groups, and desk-based work | Principally agency-applicant interaction; Engagement with broad experts on technical issues and parameters at discrete stages of assessment; Stakeholder engagement in problem formulation and model and scenario developmente |
Parameters | Sustainability in relation to social, economic, health, environment endpoints and cumulative impacts, examination of alternatives to proposed intervention | Environmental, social, economic, and health endpoints, drawing on SEA and ERA endpoints | Biosafety endpoints on environment and health |
Analysis type | Qualitative | Qualitative | Probabilistic; Qualitative; Combination of both of the aforementionedf |
Role of post-release monitoring | None | Monitoring and audit as set out in Environmental and Social Management Plan to mitigate negative or enhance positive impacts of application | Post-Marketg Environmental Monitoring to assess risks and uncertainties identified and confirm hypotheses in the ERA, including on temporal or spatial scales and reversibility [12] |