Int. J. Technology and Globalisation, Vol. 2, Nos. 1/2, 2006 65 Copyright © 2006 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. Transgenic crops, EU precaution, and developing countries Kym Anderson* CEPR, University of Adelaide, and Development Research Group, World Bank, Mailstop MC3-303, 1818 H Street NW, Washington DC 20433, USA Fax: +1 202 522 1159 E-mail: kanderson@worldbank.org *Corresponding author Lee Ann Jackson Agriculture and Commodities Division, World Trade Organization, Rue de Lausanne, 154, CH-1211 Geneva 21, Switzerland Fax: +41 22 739 5760 E-mail: leeann.jackson@wto.org Abstract: Agricultural biotechnologies have the potential to offer higher incomes for farmers in developing countries and lower-priced and better-quality food, feed and fibre. That potential is being heavily compromised, however, because of strict regulatory systems in the European Union and elsewhere governing transgenically modified (GM) crops. This paper examines why the EU has taken the extreme opposite policy position on GM food to equally affluent North America, what has been the impact on developing country welfare of the limited adoption of GM crop varieties so far, and what impact GM adoption by developing countries themselves could have on their economic welfare. Keywords: agricultural biotechnology; trade policy; regulation of standards; developing countries. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Anderson, K. and Jackson, L.A. (2006) ‘Transgenic crops, EU precaution, and developing countries’, Int. J. Technology and Globalisation, Vol. 2, Nos. 1/2, pp.65–80. Biographical notes: Kym Anderson is Professor of Economics and Foundation Executive Director of the Centre for International Economic Studies (CIES) at the University of Adelaide, but since mid-2004 he has been on leave at the World Bank’s Development Research Group. He spent 1990–1992 in the Research Division of the GATT Secretariat in Geneva. Lee Ann Jackson is an Economist in the WTO’s Agriculture and Commodities Division in Geneva. Prior to 2004 she was a Research Fellow in the Centre for International Economic Studies (CIES) and part-time Lecturer in the School of Economics at the University of Adelaide.