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The Honorable Albert Gore, Jr. 
2. We believe NIH has sufficient legal authority to require 
submissions for NIH-funded research, and to obtain or 
acquire information necessary for decisionmaking. We 
also believe it has administrative procedures to protect 
the rights of the public and the applicant as well as 
personnel and procedures to adequately evaluate the 
applications on a timely basis. 
3. We have no way of projecting the number of applications 
anticipated for field scale releases. To date, the RAC 
has reviewed three noncommercial and three commercial 
applications. We anticipate that two of the commercial 
applications will be reviewed at the June 1 RAC meeting. 
4. We have not developed a strategic plan for the imple- 
mentation of a program to evaluate commercial field 
scale release applications, nor have we developed a 
budget or workload analysis for such a program. 
5. We believe that the RAC has access to the talent and 
expertise in genetic engineering needed to assure that 
research progress and commercialization of biotechnology 
proceed in a timely fashion, while providing for appro- 
priate review to ensure public health and safety. 
Please be assured that our staff has been and continues to 
be in frequent contact with staffs of other agencies, including 
the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of 
Agriculture (USDA) , both in individual discussions and through 
the Interagency Risk Management Council. Release into the 
environment of genetically engineered organisms is a challenging 
and important subject. Our scientists and program officials are 
devoting much time and effort to considering the proper role of 
NIH in relation to EPA and USDA in future oversight of this 
matter . 
Sincerely, 
[691] 
