Bt GM Cotton less profitable than conventional Cotton as 'stink bugs' hit back
( the address of this page is www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/btcottonnoprofit.htm )

11 April 2000  

As the acreage of GM crops in the US has rapidly expanded over the last 3 or 4 years, more and more research has been slowly emerging from US universities demonstrating that these crops rarely provide economic benefits to farmers.  Either yields are disappointing or the anticipated cost savings are not materialising ( for more on this visit our web site at http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/gmagric.htm ). This has become particularly apparent with herbicide resistant and Bt corn products.  

However, despite early warning signs that the technology is already breaking down, up until now it has been assumed in many quarters that the one genuine GM financial success story for US farmers has been Bt cotton.  Farmers have been reducing insecticide applications on these crops without damaging financial returns - or at least that is how it appeared.  

The latest report from North Carolina State University now shows that in fact there is no financial gain to be had for farmers even from growing Bt cotton - in fact the latest figures show that normal cotton is marginally ($2 per acre) more profitable.   This is a blow to the reputation of the biotechnology industry's flagship GM crop, and it places a further major question mark against its long term role in US and global agriculture.  

The full North Carolina State University report can be read at  http://www.cropsci.ncsu.edu/ccn/2000/ccn-00-3d.htm. However, we provide extracts plus observations of our own below.   There is now not a single major GM commodity crop in the US which has successfully delivered what was originally promised of it by pro-biotechnology academics and industry - even though much of the farming community, the general public and the media may have been lead into believing the opposite. 

This situation is a graphic illustration of how a major 'technology' has been rapidly introduced into society on the back of  vested-interest propaganda and not sound science (to find out how this situation has been carefully constructed by the biotechnology industry visit: www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/gmlemmings.htm ).  

These latest revelations regarding the hidden, but all too common, non-delivery of genuine added-valued benefits from GM crops raise major questions about the future economic sustainability of the use of recombinant DNA technology in agriculture. For the moment, however, they certainly represent yet another great disappointment for farmers, many of whom are still prepared to place their faith in the ag-biotech industry despite its persistent track record of broken promises.

NATURAL LAW PARTY WESSEX
nlpwessex@bigfoot.com
www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex

NLP Wessex comments on:   '2000 Bollgard Cotton Performance Expectations for North Carolina Producers', North Carolina Sate University Extension Service

1. This report was published by North Carolina State University, March 2000.  It is produced by JACK S. BACHELER, Professor of Entomology ( http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/entomology/DIRECTORY/bacheler.html ).
   
2. The report is based on research data gathered since 1996 on 360 Bt ('Bollgard') cotton fields and 360 conventionally grown cotton fields.
   
3. To some degree Bt cotton has been successful in reducing damage from 'bollworm', 'European corn borrer' and 'fall armyworm'. In some of these cases the report confirms around 50 - 60 % reductions in crop damage.
   
4. However, the report also startlingly reveals that at the same time damage to cotton 'bolls' in Bt crops from 'stink bugs' have increased in Bt cotton by a staggering 430% compared to conventional cotton. (A full 'Powerpoint' slide analysis of the situation including data on stink bug damage to Bt varieties compared with conventionally managed cotton is also available from http://ipmwww.ncsu.edu/cotton/updates/slideshow/stinkbug/sld013.htm - the last three varieties listed on this slide are the conventionally managed varieties which have zero damage.  Elsewhere the slide show confirms that: "Bolgard cotton additionally has brought about increased stink bug levels". The entire presentation can be downloaded as a Powerpoint file from http://ipmwww.ncsu.edu/cotton/updates/slideshow/stinkbug/stinkbug.ppt).
   
5. The net result is that total boll damage from all pests combined was only slightly less in the Bt cotton.
   
6. Because the overall difference is so small the 'advantages' provided by the Bt cotton were insufficient to recover the additional cost of the Bt seed, with the result that the University predicts that conventional cotton will be marginally more profitable than Bt cotton for farmers in 2000 (by $2.21 per acre).
   
7. The concluding advice from North Carolina State University is:
   
   "With the overall insect-related costs and returns of the two systems so close, the importance of varietal selection, especially choosing those varieties with a 2 or 3-year history of favorable Official Variety Test results, when possible, is very important. Planting Bollgard (or stacked-Bollgard plus Roundup Ready) varieties with little or no North Carolina testing history can be risky."
   
   Additionally the university states that with the continued use of Bt cotton "shifts toward higher stink bug, and sometimes plant bug, levels can be expected".
   
8. A lot of American farmers are notorious for bad farming practice - particularly in their failure to rotate crops properly and to deploy systems of integrated pest management. This style of farming encourages pest infestations. 
   
9. Were systems of integrated crop management to be deployed more fully in the US then it is likely that the financial balance would be tipped even further away from GM crops in favour of conventional seed varieties.
   
10. It is ironic, therefore, that the US is trying to impose these types of crop on the rest of the world, when primarily they have been developed as a 'crutch' to support its own bad husbandry practices. These have already lost US farmers control over much of their local 'agro-ecology'. 
    
11. It is already clear that this 'crutch', far from helping the situation, is playing its role in creating ever greater long term husbandry problems for US farmers.  Even before these latest findings in North Carolina farmers in US southern states had been prohibited from planting more than 50% of their acreage to Bt crops because of the risk of the rapid development of pest resistance which threatens to make the technology impotent.
    ( see: http://www.ncga.com/02profits/insectMgmtPlan/fig1a.htm and http://ens.lycos.com/ens/jan2000/2000L-01-17-06.html )
    

Now that the sacred cow of GM crops (Bt cotton) is starting to slide off her throne perhaps there is the chance that US farmers will finally wake up from their slumber. Perhaps they will be prepared to learn some important lessons vital to their own self-preservation against the parasitic might of the monopolistic transnational biotechnology corporations - in particular: 

• Never believe any claims from the biotechnology industry until those claims have been demonstrated over a respectable period of time by independent research in realistic conditions.
  
• Don't grow GM crops just because your neighbour does - ask him to provide independent research data from field trials supporting his variety selection decision. The chances are your neighbour is just following his own neighbour without access to data.
  
• It really is no good thinking that you can outsmart nature through invasive technology of this kind.  You have to work with nature not against her, because she is always much smarter than any man in a white lab coat.
  
• Start taking a look at integrated pest and crop management systems. They give you back control, satisfaction, and they work.
  
• Start using your mind and not your bank loan facility.  Put money into your own pocket not the biotechnology industry's.
  
  "Farmers will be given just enough to keep them interested in growing the crops, but no more.  And GM companies and food processors, will say very clearly how they want the growers to grow the crops."
  Friedrich Vogel, head of BASF's crop protection business (Farmers Weekly 6 November 1998)
  
• For more information on the use of integrated pest and crop management systems in the US and elsewhere see:
  http://www.pmac.net/ and www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/geneticsmyth.htm
  

NATURAL LAW PARTY WESSEX
nlpwessex@bigfoot.com
www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex

2000 Bollgard Cotton Performance Expectations for North Carolina Producers

Jack S. Bacheler, Extension Entomologist
North Carolina State University
(CCN - 00 - 3d  March 2000)

Table 2. Average Projected 2000 Insect Control Costs and Damage ($/Acre) of Bollgard vs. Conventional Cotton for North Carolina Producers:

^a Technology fee varies according to seed rate and row spacing.
^b Pyrethroid = $5.50/acre; application = $2.00/acre.
^c Damage: Value of the difference in damage shown in bold.- 1% boll damage equals approx.12 lb. lint/acre; Cotton = $0.65/lb.
^d Scouting requirements for Bollgard typically exceed those needed for conventional cotton.

Fundamental scientific conceptual errors in the development of recombinant DNA technology

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