53 



b. Indicate its confidence in the judgement of the SAB by providing the Board 

 with the option of reviewing the draft report to Congress or attesting to an al- 

 ternative external peer review mechanism, when confronted with competing de- 

 mands on the Board's schedule. Given the Agency's recently announced Peer 

 Review Policy and its rapid movement toward implementation, I am confident 

 that the Agency is developing a series of alternatives and credible mechanisms 

 for gaining quality peer review. 



Such a "right of first refusal" would seem to meet the desire of Congress for inde- 

 pendent, quality reviews of technical Agency reports to Congress and the Board's 

 desire to target strategically its efforts across the broad range of Agency activities. 1 



Statement of Allan M. Ford 



While I am here as a private individual, it is important to note that I am a Re- 

 search Professor at Lamar University and operate a research program of eight Gulf 

 Coast universities partially funded by EPA as well as the State of Texas and private 

 industry. I am retired as Director of Monsanto Company's Environmental Sciences 

 Center, a large industrial environmental research laboratory, and I serve in various 

 elected and appointed capacities within the American Chemical Society (ACS). In 

 addition, I am co-editor of the journal Waste Management. I represent none of these 

 but, again, I am here as a private individual. 



Since I am an elected member of the board of the nearly 6,000 member environ- 

 ment division of ACS and the ACS's policy recommending committee on Environ- 

 mental Improvement as well as its task force on Environmental Research funding, 

 I will borrow liberally from Society policy statements but, again, do not represent 

 the ACS and will depart from their official policy statements in substantial ways. 



It is of particular concern to me that many of the long-term environmental im- 

 pacts are not addressable with current technology. We are living in a world that 

 is growing more people than its resources can support. With a current population 

 of five and one half billion people, current trends suggest that we could reach as 

 many as 10 billion people in 30 to 40 years. Most major environmental issues have 

 worldwide impact well beyond the United States. 



There is, however, a concurrent trend that has significant environmental impact. 

 The world is getting more democratic. More societies are coming to have some say 

 in determining their quality of life. Movement to democracy in countries from Ar- 

 gentina to Russia have allowed more voters to impact their own quality of life. In 

 addition, improvement in communications world-wide have allowed people in coun- 

 tries without elected government to view more progressive societies. This has caused 

 non-elected governments to likewise exhibit an intent to improve the quality of life 

 of the average citizen. This will indeed be difficult since environmental effects are 

 often not noticeable to the average person until extensive damage is done. 



In this kind of atmosphere, few governments are going to be able to accept a lower 

 quality of life for their citizenry. But if we are to have a long-term future, we must 

 be able to provide a quality of life that meets the expectations of a demanding public 

 without unduly damaging the environment. Included in quality of life are many 

 goods and services including such basics as food stuffs and normal human activity 

 that have environmental impact. 



There is little evidence of any general rule that the production of goods and serv- 

 ices needs to entail high risk to the environment. On the contrary, agricultural 

 chemicals, for example, are less toxic and less persistent than they were a genera- 

 tion ago. With the current interest in integrating various chemical and non-chemical 

 technologies for managing pests, the risk to the environment from producing agri- 

 cultural products is diminishing. The understanding of the role of the various as- 



1 It is important to recognize that the Board's endeavors go well beyond simply reviewing doc- 

 uments. They include such important activities as conducting special projects which provide a 

 scientific overview (like Reducing Risk\ advising on research plans, and evaluating professional 

 publications by Agency scientists. 



