Some farmers like biotech crop production.
December 4, 1999
Farmers Stick With Biotech Crops
Filed at 11:33 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Two months ago, Minnesota farmer Mark Ufer was
ready to swear off genetically engineered crops. He figured the growing
controversy over biotech food would make it easier to sell conventional corn
and soybeans next year.
Now that it is time to order next year's seed, he has changed his mind.
``The genetically enhanced movement is so widespread that I don't think a
person can realistically not be a part of it,' he said.
Farmers have been switching in droves to genetically engineered corn and
soybeans over the past three years. There is growing evidence that they plan
to stick with the crops next year despite backlashes against biotechnology in
Europe and Japan and producers' lingering worries about the industry's
future.
Two-thirds of the corn seed and three-quarters of the soybean seed that
farmers have ordered from Novartis Seeds Inc. for next year are genetically
engineered, a slight increase over this time a year ago.
Novartis is among the nation's largest seed suppliers. About 70 percent of the
corn seed and half the soybean seed that Novartis expects to sell for the 2000
crop had been ordered as of Dec. 1.
The demand for biotech seed ``is as strong as it's been at any time since we
introduced it,' said Jack Bernens, the company's vice president of marketing.
The government estimates that 57 percent of the soybeans that farmers grew
this year contains a gene that allows it to tolerate use of the popular Roundup
weed killer. Another 30 percent of the corn grown this year was biotech,
engineered to make it toxic to the European corn borer, a chronic problem
for farmers.
In a Nov. 22 letter to investment analysts, Monsanto Co. acknowledged that
there was more indecision than usual among farmers as to their planting
intentions for next year. But Monsanto's market research indicates the
demand for biotech seed will be ``on par with the 1999 season,' the letter
said.
Monsanto has a lot at stake. Along with holding patents in the technology,
Monsanto sells seed though its Asgrow and DeKalb subsidiaries, and also
makes the Roundup herbicide.
The American Soybean Association, which is holding a series of seminars in
the Midwest to sound out farmers and address their misgivings about
biotechnology, also is not expecting any wholesale shift to conventional
varieties.
``We have no reason to believe that the adoption of the technology will not
continue,' spokesman Bob Callanan said. ``We still think there's strong
interest from the growers. ... The growers like and have embraced the
technology.'
A series of developments caught farmers by surprise this summer and early
this fall, which led to fears they would have trouble selling their biotech
crops. That in turn would make it difficult to recover the seeds' higher costs.
Amid the growing controversy over biotech crops, baby-food makers Gerber
and Heinz announced they no longer would use genetically modified
ingredients.
A major U.S. grain processor announced plans to pay a premium for
conventional crops, while a second company advised its suppliers to start
separately storing conventional and biotech grain.
Analysts feared the moves would lead to price cuts on biotech grain, if not
this fall then next year, and a shortage of conventional seed varieties next
spring.
As it turns out, relatively few grain elevators have been requiring farmers to
separate their crops, surveys have found. The feared price cuts for biotech
grain have not materialized, either.
One major grain buyer, Cargill Inc., is even paying an extra 5 cents a bushel
for soybeans that contain low amounts of dust and other foreign matter,
which typically means the biotech variety, said Callanan.
Ufer, who farms near Truman, Minn., sells much of his corn to an ethanol
cooperative, whose board voted not to accept genetically modified crops as
of next year. The problem for the cooperative is that it sells a byproduct,
distillers' grain, for export as livestock feed.
The cooperative since has reversed its decision. That has eased some of
Ufer's concerns.
But he, like other farmers, still has a variety of concerns they are weighing as
they order seed. The genetically engineered corn, for example, will cost
farmers money if infestations of the European corn borer are low. Also, the
herbicide-tolerant soybeans sometimes yield less than conventional varieties,
farmers have found.
Producers face ``real tough management calls that are going to be made on a
farm-to-farm basis and in some cases on a field-by-field basis,' said Ross
Korves, an economist for the American Farm Bureau Federation.
The American Corn Growers Association, the smaller of two organizations
representing corn farmers and a critic of biotechnology, predicts a 20 percent
to 25 percent reduction in genetically engineered corn next year.
``If the consumer unrest continues, we think that this issue is not going
away,' said Gary Goldberg, a spokesman for the group.
Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company |
