Large transnational corporations dominate the global seed production and sale business, and relentlessly promote their expensive proprietary seeds and related technologies to farmers, the public, politicians, governmental bureaucracies and philanthropic foundations. Universities and other public research institutions, which were once dedicated to public good science rather than private proprietary technologies, have almost abandoned working with farmers to produce improved seed varieties which are adapted to local conditions, do not require expensive artificial inputs and large amounts of water to produce well, and can be reproduced on the farm rather than being purchased every year.
This is the context in which genetically-engineered crops are boosted as the best or only answer to ending hunger and poverty, and sustainable, low-input agronomy, which already performs better on both counts, goes begging for research and development investment. The two brief articles below look at both sides of the picture.
This is the context in which genetically-engineered crops are boosted as the best or only answer to ending hunger and poverty, and sustainable, low-input agronomy, which already performs better on both counts, goes begging for research and development investment. The two brief articles below look at both sides of the picture.
Myth-busting: transgenic crops do not cure hunger and poverty
Transgenic crops are touted as having multiple and interconnected physical, social and economic benefits. Sorting out fact from fiction therefore involves first checking whether the alleged physical benefit is real, and then whether there is any necessary or actual connection between that benefit and the social or economic benefit it may be linked to. Here goes...*
Better yields? There are currently no transgenic crops grown commercially which have been engineered to increase yield, so any yield gains are a secondary rather than a primary effect of the engineering. This secondary effect may occur if there is less weed or insect competition for the crop as a result of GM technology applications. The evidence that it does occur is so year, crop and location dependent that it is fair to say that increased yields are not a primary or significant feature of GM crops. Further, as more weeds and insects become resistant to glyphosate and Bt, these protection benefits are rapidly disappearing.
Better diets? There is no necessary connection between increasing yields and alleviating hunger among the chronically malnourished. Economic and political factors are far more important in reducing or improving access to adequate diets than constraints on the yields of commodity crops grown for further processing. Insofar as technologies have a role to play in improving diets, they must be technologies that can be applied cheaply to a variety of foods grown close to the point of consumption.
Better incomes? Nor is there any necessary connection between higher crop yields and higher incomes for farmers, be they Africans or Americans. The two major external constraints on net income are the market into which the crop is sold, and the cost of inputs to grow the crop. The markets for commodity crops are currently so distorted by governments, trading blocs and global agribusiness corporations that dumping is rife. Higher yields in the USA have (inevitably) led to lower prices, and to American soy, maize and cotton producers being propped up by subsidies which are contributing to the destruction of many of these producers in the rest of the world. Subsidised industrial-scale farmers can afford to buy expensive inputs every year, such as proprietary engineered seeds and the proprietary herbicides and fertilisers needed to get the best performance from them. Non-subsidised, non-industrial-scale farmers have to go into debt to buy them, and often end up poorer than before.
Better environmental protection? It is claimed that the current generation of GM crops are better for the environment because they reduce the use of toxic herbicides and insecticides. The IAASTD* found that there was insufficient evidence to prove this claim. Further, it found that because of the build-up of resistance due to the over-planting of GM crops and over-use of associated agro-chemicals, GM crops are reducing and not improving the options for more environmentally benign farming practices in the future wherever they have been widely applied in the present.
* For what the International Assessment on Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) had to say on sustainable yields and GM crops see Jack Heinemann (2009) Hope Not Hype, pp 53-62; 145-158. For what it had to say on pesticides and transgenics see pp 63-78. For a well-documented example of trangenics driving debt see Witt, Patel and Schnurr (2006) 'Can the Poor Help GM crops?' in Review of African Political Economy. The promotion of lending to purchase GM cotton seed and associated inputs in Kwa-Zulu Natal province, South Africa, led to the 2,537 farmers involved racking up a collective debt of US$3 million over six years, which they were unable to service from sale of their crops.
Eco-realities: sustainable techniques for better nutrition and livelihoods
There are proven technologies being applied in agriculture today which actually deliver the benefits being claimed for GM. Here is what they are.*
Better yields. Breeding more productive (and tastier) plants and animals was traditionally a farm-based activity, and it is only in the past century or so that scientists have got into the act. The most successful new varieties have resulted from collaborative breeding programmes, where scientists work with farmers to produce varieties which are best adapted to performing successfully within the natural opportunities and constraints of particular sites and landscapes of production. For such improved varieties to be adopted on a scale which makes a significant impact on food supply in poorer countries, they need to be 'open source' (not containing privatised intellectual property and hence subject to rent-seeking restrictions on use, like patented GM varieties). In this regard it is vitally important to protect the genes of traditional varieties (which may be used as the basis for public good breeding programmes) from being privatised.
Better diets. Tragically, a large percentage of the most hungry and/or malnourished people in today's world are the rural poor. Such people need technologies and methods which address existing constraints to greater production for little or no cost. Fortunately there are a whole suite of such techniques producing good results on small farms around the world today.
They include
They include
- enhancing soil structure, depth and fertility via cover-cropping with nitrogen- fixing plants, compost, and animal manures
- low cost, small-scale water harvesting technologies and methods
- agroforestry and tree cropping
- crop diversification, rotation and intercropping
- ecologically beneficial weed and pest prevention and control methods
Using such methods in a range of African conditions it has been possible to raise yields by two to two and half times, across a variety of nutritious crops.
Better incomes. Farmer incomes are determined by the costs of production and by the prices paid for what they produce. Agroecological techniques of production raise yields without significantly raising the costs of producing them. So far so much better than GM production. Unfortunately farmers don't have the same level of control over prices paid, and for this there is no technological fix.
Better environmental protection. Engineering herbicide-resistance into widely-planted crops is a recipe for spreading resistance into weeds. There are now nine weeds known to be glyphosate-resistant, and it is anyone's guess how long it will continue to be cost-effective to apply it. It was never that environmentally-friendly in any case. Its major claim to environmental superiority over organic methods was that it facilitated zero-till cropping, and hence soil protection, but that claim was disproven almost a decade ago by a nine year USDA study which found that the standard organic practices of cover cropping, diverse rotations and intercropping more than compensated for tilling done for weed control, leaving organic soils higher in both carbon and nitrogen than zero-till soils. As for engineering insecticides into crops - that not only creates a resistance problem down the track, but reduces ecological control options still further by affecting non-target and beneficial species.
* Results and summaries of studies which investigate the practice and benefits of sustainable agrotechnologies can be found in Jack Heinemann (2009) Hope Not Hype The future of agriculture guided by the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development
and Jules Pretty (2002) Agri-culture. Reconnecting People, Land and Nature.
The USDA research on tillage, and other organic no-till studies and methods, can be accessed via www.ifoam.org/growing_organic/1_arguments_for_oa/criticisms_misconceptions/misconceptions_no8.html
Nine excellent case study examples of East African farmers and villages successfully utilising sustainable agriculture approaches to increase yields and incomes can be found in Sustainable Agriculture: A pathway out of poverty for East Africa's rural poor, available at
www.sustainet.org/download/sustainet_publication_eafrica_part1.pdf
