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India: Debate on GM cotton

Argentina: Trading old bonds for new

Women’s rights: Under attack from neo-conservatives

Banks serve poorest countries best

China: Market economy and dictatorship still co-exist


04/2005		  

[ Genetic engineering ]

Debate on Bt cotton continues in India

India’s Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) certified six new types of genetically modified cotton in March. This will give new impetus to the argument over what use the insect-resistant “Bt cotton” has for Indian farmers. A research team led by the agricultural economist Matin Qaim, from the University of Hohenheim, has recently published new findings on this question. Their study says that, overall, farmers made a profit in the first commercial planting season after the release of three types of Bt cotton by the GEAC in 2002. But there were considerable differences from region to region. For example, farmers in the state of Andhra Pradesh who switched to the Bt cotton suffered a loss. Critics of genetic engineering question the results. Suman Sahai, head of the non-governmental Gene Campaign in Delhi, says that there are numerous studies which prove that cultivation in the 2002/2003 season was a disaster in other states, just like in Andhra Pradesh.

In 2003, Qaim’s team interviewed farmers in four Indian states (Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh) on their results with insect-resistant cotton produced by Mahyco. Mahyco is a subsidiary of the US corporation Monsanto, the world leader in genetically modified crops and owner of the rights to the Bt technology. The researchers argue that, nationwide, the cultivation of Bt cotton was overall profitable. The farmers needed much less insecticide and yields were 34 percent higher than with conventional varieties. It is true that the Bt seeds are more than three times as expensive as traditional varieties, but higher yields had, in sum, increased the farmers’ profits by two thirds.

Andhra Pradesh was the only region where the Bt cotton resulted in losses for farmers, according to Qaim and his colleagues. Their explanation is as follows: firstly, farmers in Andhra Pradesh normally loose less of their conventional cotton because they use more insecticide. Consequently, insect-resistant varieties did not make the same difference as elsewhere. Secondly, many of the farmers interviewed in Andhra Pradesh had been affected by a drought, and the three varieties of Bt cotton certified for planting in 2002 are not very tolerant to water shortages. The report states: “In general, negative germplasm effects have to be expected whenever conventional hybrids are better adapted to local biotic and abiotic stress factors than the germplasm into which the Bt gene is incorporated.”

According to Suman Sahai, the NGO activist from Delhi, the fact that local varieties without genetical modification showed better results than the Mahyco cotton was not only evident in Andhra Pradesh, but in all states where Bt cotton was planted in 2002/2003. This was the conclusion of research carried out by civil society organisations as well as by government scientists. The Ministry of Agriculture in Karnataka determined that the Bt cotton produced higher yields but earned lower market prices – if there were any profits at all with Bt cotton, then they were low. The government of Maharashtra came to similar conclusions, while Gujarat’s Ministry of Agriculture reported that Bt cotton caused heavy losses for the farmers in the 2002/2003 season. Sahai says that this is the case not only for the first cultivation season: “The Monsanto cotton does not do well anywhere, neither in Andhra, nor anywhere else, with the exception in the first year in the irrigated belt in Tamil Nadu.”

Sahai does not rule out the possibility that India may also experience good crop levels with genetically-modified cotton. A variety of Bt cotton released in April 2004 by the manufacturer Rasi Seed did well in its first season. This finding of GM opponent Sahai of course backs up the central conclusion by the proponents of genetical engineering: Qaim and his team advocate accelerating the certification procedure for new Bt varieties in India, so that there are always insect-resistant versions of the newest and best hybrids available. In their opinion, “A sufficiently large number of modified hybrids and varieties, well adapted to diverse conditions, is important to maximise the agronomic and economic advantages of GM crops.”

Tillmann Elliesen


More information:
http://www.genecampaign.org