GM Crops - BT Cotton
In the past, cultivation of crops involved usage of humungous amounts of pesticides and insecticides, to keep pests and insects at bay, which would otherwise destroy the crop. Actually the practice is still being followed all over the world for a majority of crops. With the advancement of research and development in the field of bio-technology, scientists have come up with techniques to modify the DNA of plants to make them immune to the damage caused by pests and insects. These crops with altered DNA are called GM (read genetically modified) crops. The GM technology is prevalent in many countries in the world like USA, Canada, Japan, Australia to name a few.
The GM technology entered India in 1995, when the US biotech gaint Monsanto teamed up with India's Mahyco to import GM cotton seeds and verify if they could adapt to the Indian conditions. Then in 2002, the Indian Government allowed farmers to cultivate Bt cotton which is the only GM crop to be commercially grown in India. This GM cotton is also commonly called Bt cotton, where the 'bt' stands for Bacillus thuringiensis. This bacteria naturall produces a chemical harmful to a small fraction of insects, most notably the larvae of moths and butterflies, beetles, and flies, and harmless to other forms of life. This eliminates the need to use large amounts of broad-spectrum insecticides to kill pests. The use of bt cotton does not completely eliminate the use of pesticides and insecticides as the bacteria is ineffective against many cotton pests, however, such as plant bugs, stink bugs, and aphids.
Recently there had been news that Monsanto, the company that developed bt cotton, admitted that the common cotton pest--pink bollworm--has developed resistance to bt cotton. I addition to this, the company blamed pink bollworm resistance in Gujarat to "early use of unapproved Bt cotton seeds" by farmers and "limited refuge planting". Farmers are supposed to maintain a distance between Bt cotton farms and other farms as a "refuge". It has asked farmers to shift to another variety of Bt cotton. The readers are free to make their own conclusions.
In 2009, high prices of Bt Cotton were blamed for forcing farmers of the district Jhabua into severe debts when the crops died due to lack of rain. In reality, not only has Bt cotton been rendered ineffective, it has also led to detection of some new pests never before reported from India. This sounds promising for the company Monsanto, but a sad state of affairs for cotton farmers who have to do it probably even higher seed prices.
It would be cruel to completely blame the company, the problem also lies partly with the government and farmers too.
Firstly, a weak regulatory mechanism has led to the emergence of many spurious varieties labelled Bt cotton, as well as unauthorised companies selling the cotton in India, so much so that there are allegedly four types of cotton in India namely legal illegal, fake legal, fake illegal.
Secondly, farmers mostly do not follow refugia standards.When proper refugia standards are not followed, contamination can result from the cross-flow of pollen between Bt and non-Bt varieties. The result may be new genetic combinations that fail to express the Bt toxin enough for adequate protection from the bollworm. This causes crop loss, subsequent loss to the farmers. The farmers should be properly educated and made aware of these standards, which is the responsibility of the government. Also the government has very unscrupulously copied the refugia standards prevalent in America, when the species of bollworm found in America is different from the species found in India.
The government should fund proper research in determining the best possible refugia strategy to deal with bollworm found in India. It should then educate the farmers to use this strategy while planting cotton crops. The government should also prevent the introduction of other GM food crops in India, unless they have been proved successfull, for a significant period of time, in other countries.
The GM technology entered India in 1995, when the US biotech gaint Monsanto teamed up with India's Mahyco to import GM cotton seeds and verify if they could adapt to the Indian conditions. Then in 2002, the Indian Government allowed farmers to cultivate Bt cotton which is the only GM crop to be commercially grown in India. This GM cotton is also commonly called Bt cotton, where the 'bt' stands for Bacillus thuringiensis. This bacteria naturall produces a chemical harmful to a small fraction of insects, most notably the larvae of moths and butterflies, beetles, and flies, and harmless to other forms of life. This eliminates the need to use large amounts of broad-spectrum insecticides to kill pests. The use of bt cotton does not completely eliminate the use of pesticides and insecticides as the bacteria is ineffective against many cotton pests, however, such as plant bugs, stink bugs, and aphids.
Recently there had been news that Monsanto, the company that developed bt cotton, admitted that the common cotton pest--pink bollworm--has developed resistance to bt cotton. I addition to this, the company blamed pink bollworm resistance in Gujarat to "early use of unapproved Bt cotton seeds" by farmers and "limited refuge planting". Farmers are supposed to maintain a distance between Bt cotton farms and other farms as a "refuge". It has asked farmers to shift to another variety of Bt cotton. The readers are free to make their own conclusions.
In 2009, high prices of Bt Cotton were blamed for forcing farmers of the district Jhabua into severe debts when the crops died due to lack of rain. In reality, not only has Bt cotton been rendered ineffective, it has also led to detection of some new pests never before reported from India. This sounds promising for the company Monsanto, but a sad state of affairs for cotton farmers who have to do it probably even higher seed prices.
It would be cruel to completely blame the company, the problem also lies partly with the government and farmers too.
Firstly, a weak regulatory mechanism has led to the emergence of many spurious varieties labelled Bt cotton, as well as unauthorised companies selling the cotton in India, so much so that there are allegedly four types of cotton in India namely legal illegal, fake legal, fake illegal.
Secondly, farmers mostly do not follow refugia standards.When proper refugia standards are not followed, contamination can result from the cross-flow of pollen between Bt and non-Bt varieties. The result may be new genetic combinations that fail to express the Bt toxin enough for adequate protection from the bollworm. This causes crop loss, subsequent loss to the farmers. The farmers should be properly educated and made aware of these standards, which is the responsibility of the government. Also the government has very unscrupulously copied the refugia standards prevalent in America, when the species of bollworm found in America is different from the species found in India.
The government should fund proper research in determining the best possible refugia strategy to deal with bollworm found in India. It should then educate the farmers to use this strategy while planting cotton crops. The government should also prevent the introduction of other GM food crops in India, unless they have been proved successfull, for a significant period of time, in other countries.
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