GM crops increase pesticides
MEDIA ADVISORY
Friends of the Earth International
February 13, 2008
NEW REPORT: GM CROPS INCREASE PESTICIDE USE
In 2007 GM crops still failed to tackle hunger and poverty in developing countries
BRUSSELS (BELGIUM), LAGOS (NIGERIA), KUALA LUMPUR (MALAYSIA) – February 13, 2008 – A new report released on February 13th shows that planting genetically modified (GM) crops is causing an increased use of harmful pesticides in major biotech crop producing countries. [1]
The 2008 edition of the Friends of the Earth International “Who Benefits from GM crops?” report series is titled “The Rise in Pesticide Use” and concludes that GM crops on the market today have on the whole caused an increase rather than a decrease in toxic pesticides use, and have failed to tackle hunger and poverty. [2]
After more than a decade of GM crop cultivation, more than 70% of the area cultivated with biotech crops is still concentrated in only two countries: the US and Argentina. To date, GM crops have done nothing to alleviate hunger or poverty in Africa or elsewhere.
“The biotech industry is telling Africans that we need GM crops to tackle the food needs of our population. But how can we believe such statements when the majority of GM crops are used to feed the animals of rich countries, produce industrial products like agrofuels, and overall don’t yield more than conventional crops?”, said Nnimmo Bassey of Friends of the Earth Nigeria/ERA.
“GM crops still fail to deliver the long-promised benefits. They are not good for the environment, as they are increasing pesticide use. In addition, they do not benefit small farmers or consumers in terms of quality or price,” added Bassey.
The new report launch coincides with the annual release of the “Global Status of Commercialized Biotech” report of the industry-sponsored International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) which promotes GM crops as beneficial for the environment and a key solution to hunger and poverty.
The GM crops industry continues to misleadingly claim that GM
crops reduce pesticide use and play a role in tackling poverty and
hunger. The main conclusions of the 2008 report “The Rise in
Pesticide Use” include :
1) GM crops are not ‘green’.
The adoption of Roundup Ready (RR) crops, the most extensively grown
GM crop today, has led to an increase in pesticide use:
- In
the United States, data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture
(USDA) shows that RR crops drove a more than 15-fold increase in the
use of glyphosate –the herbicide associated with RR crops- on major
field crops from 1994 to 2005. In 2006, the last year for which data
is available, glyphosate use on soybeans jumped a substantial 28%.
The intensity of glyphosate use has also risen dramatically. From
1994 to 2006, the amount of glyphosate applied per acre of soya rose
by more than 150%.
The increase in glyphosate herbicide is no
longer displacing other herbicides in the US. From 2002 to 2006 the
use of 2,4-D –one of the most widely used herbicide in the world-
on soybeans more than doubled, and the use of atrazine (an herbicide
banned in Europe due to links to health problems) on corn increased
by 12 per cent from 2002 to 2005.
- In major RR soybean
producer countries, like Brazil and Argentina, glyphosate use and
weed resistance have risen. A 2007 study by a Brazilian governmental
agency shows that the use of glyphosate increased 79,6% between 2000
to 2005, much faster than the expansion in area planted with RR soya.
In 2007 a glyphosate-resistant weed called Johnson Grass infested
over 120,000 ha in Argentina. An estimated 25 million litres of
herbicides other than glyphosate will be needed, resulting in
increasing production costs of between $160 to 950 million per year.
In India, a 2007 study from Andhra University concluded that Bt
cotton uses the same amount of pesticides as conventional cotton.
2) GM crops do not tackle hunger or poverty. Most GM crops
commercialized so far are destined for animal feed, not for food, and
none have been introduced to address hunger and poverty issues. GM
crops are not providing help to small farmers in developing
countries. In South Africa, for example since the adoption of Bt
cotton, the number of small cotton farmers have plummeted from 3229
in 2001/02 to just 853 in 2006/07.
3) Overall, current GM
crops do not yield more than other existing crop varieties:
-
RR Soybeans, the most widely planted GM crop in the world, does not
have a higher yield performance than conventional soya. On the
contrary, many studies show that RR soya has on average 5-10% lower
yield than equivalent conventional varieties.
- Bt cotton
does not have higher yields than conventional cotton. In most
countries where Bt cotton was adopted -such as the U.S., Argentina,
Colombia, and Australia – overall cotton yields remained constant .
In other countries, like India and China, the yield increase is
mainly due to weather conditions and other production factors not
related to GM technology. For example Xinjiang, the Chinese province
with the highest cotton production and the highest average yield in
China, grows mostly conventional cotton, not Bt varieties.
FOR
MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
- AFRICA:
Nnimmo Bassey,
Friends of the Earth Nigeria,
Tel: +234 8037274395 (mobile)
or +234 52602680 (office)
- ASIA:
Nizam Mahshar,
Friends of the Earth Malaysia,
Tel: +60 194777755
- EUROPE:
Helen Holder, Friends of the Earth Europe in Brussels:
Tel: +32
474 857 638 or +32 2 542 01 82
- NORTH AMERICA:
Bill
Freese, Center for Food Safety, United States,
Tel: +1 202 (547) 9359
- SOUTH AMERICA:
David Cardozo, Friends of the Earth
Paraguay,
Tel: +595 981 445067
NOTES TO EDITORS:
[1] DOCUMENTS AVAILABLE ONLINE:
A Question and Answer
document on GM crops and the Millennium Development Goals of halving
hunger and poverty by 2015 is available at:
http://www.foeeurope.org/GMOs/Who_Benefits/QA_FINAL_FEB08.pdf
The executive summary of the report is available online at
http://www.foei.org/publications/pdfs/gmcrops2008execsummary.pdf/
The executive summary of the report is available IN
SPANISH online at:
http://www.foei.org/es/publications/pdfs/gmcrops2008execsummary.pdf/
The executive summary of the report is available IN FRENCH
online at:
http://www.foei.org/fr/publications/pdfs/gmcrops2008execsummary.pdf/
The full report is available online at
http://www.foei.org/en/publications/pdfs/gmcrops2008full.pdf/
[2] Previous editions of the ‘Who Benefits from GM
crops’ series are online at:
http://www.foei.org/en/campaigns/gmo/publications
