Doug Gurian-Sherman comments on our post below:
What is not obvious from this paper is how minor this impact is in the scheme of things. The 6.9 billion dollar benefit sounds very large, but in the context of the huge size and value of the corn crop, this amount is really just a large drop in a huge bucket. The value of the corn crop for the five major corn growing states examined in the paper over the 14 years of the study is about 232 billion dollars according to rough calculations using US Department of Agriculture data. In other words, 6.9 billion dollars is only 3 percent of the value of the crop. This is in line with the small gains contributed by Bt to corn yields over this period. The yield gain from Bt for corn borer (the subject of the new Science paper) and rootworm together has been about 3 to 4 percent, while by contrast conventional breeding and other methods have increased yield by about 24 to 25 percent over the same period. So, since the increased corn value in the Science paper is proportional to yield gain from Bt, we can approximate that the much larger yield gains from breeding and improved agronomy would amount to about 56 billion dollars, using the values from the paper--quite a bit more than he 6.9 billion from Bt (this is an approximation, because the 24 to 25 percent figure is based on US national data, rather than the five states of the Science paper, but it is likely that the yield increases in the five major corn growing states was similar to national values). It is a valid point to determine the added value from Bt, but it is important to understand the bigger picture, and understand this value in the broader context--something that the authors of the Science paper do not consider.
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It pays not to cultivate GM crops
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=12556:it-pays-not-to-cultivate-gm-crops
NOTE: Even if we assume that this analysis [below] is correct, any such benefit to neighbouring non-GM farmers will only last until resistance develops in corn borers. And what about the deficits neighbouring non-GM growers can suffer as a result of GM crops?
For example, what about the explosion in secondary pests found with Bt cotton in China that has affected a whole range of neighbouring crops (ie not just cotton)?
"Numbers of mirid bugs (insects of the Miridae family), previously only minor pests in northern China, have increased 12-fold since 1997, they found. 'Mirids are now a main pest in the region,' says Wu. 'Their rise in abundance is associated with the scale of Bt cotton cultivation.'"
http://bit.ly/cYJT05
What about conventional farmers hit by resistant weed seed blowing everywhere as with Palmer Amaranth - more commonly known as Palmer pigweed, which has infested cotton and soya farms across the southern US and is expected to affect new areas and crops [as a result of the use of Rpoundup Ready crops].
http://bit.ly/a66rDm
And what about the huge costs arising from the GM contamination of non-GM crops, as with US rice and Canadian flax, to take just two recent examples?
http://www.gmcontaminationregister.org/
http://bit.ly/aUTZzK
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It pays NOT to cultivate GM crops, survey finds
Steve Connor, Science Editor
The Independent, 8 October 2010
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/it-pays-unotu-to-cultivate-gm-crops-survey-finds-2100999.html
The first economic analysis of growing genetically modified crops on a wide scale has found that the biggest winners were the farmers who decided not to grow them.
The study, which looked at maize yields in the corn belt of the United States, found that farmers who continued to grow conventional crops actually earned more money over a 14-year period than those who cultivated GM varieties.
All farmers benefited from the significantly lower level of pests that came about after the introduction of GM maize to the US in 1996, but the conventional farmers who continued to cultivate non-GM varieties also benefited financially from not having to pay the extra costs of purchasing GM seeds.
Previous studies into the economics of growing GM crops have concentrated on the farmers who have taken up the technology, but the latest research looked at a wider area, including non-GM fields that may have benefited from being near fields planted with GM varieties.
GM maize, which is called corn in the US, has a bacterial gene called "Bt" added to it so that the plant excretes a protein which has a toxic effect on the European corn borer, a serious insect pest introduced accidentally into America in 1917.
Nearly two-thirds of the US corn belt is now cultivated with Bt maize, and it has had a dramatic impact on the decline of the corn borer moth, which cannot distinguish between the GM and conventional varieties. When female moths lay their eggs on Bt corn, the larvae die within two days of hatching.
Paul Mitchell, an agricultural economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where the work was carried out, said the main corn-growing states of Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska experienced a total economic benefit of $6.9bn (£4.6bn) over the period from 1996 to 2009 as a result of less maize being lost to the corn-borer pest.
But the non-GM corn areas accounted for 62 per cent of this total economic benefit because, in addition to preventing crop losses resulting from lower levels of pests, these farmers did not have to spend any extra money on the technology fees associated with the purchase of GM maize.
"Previous cost-benefit analyses focused directly on transgenic crop acres. This study is the first to include the value of area-wide pest suppression and the subsequent benefits to growers of non-transgenic crops," Dr Mitchell said. "In this case, the value of the indirect yield benefits for non-Bt crops exceeded the net value of direct benefits to the BT corn acres."
The study, published in the journal Science, found that Wisconsin farmers benefited to the tune of $325m (£217m) as a result of the overall suppression of the corn borer pest between 1996 and 2009. About 75 per cent of this cumulative economic benefit went to the farmers who cultivated non-GM maize.
William Hutchinson of the University of Minnesota, the study's lead author, said an analysis showed that the European corn borer moth has declined in the fields neighbouring those of GM crops by between 28 and 73 per cent, depending on the initial level of infection. The scientists were able to make these estimates because of good records of pest populations going back 45 years.
"Additionally, environmental benefits from corn borer suppression are likely occurring, such as less insecticide use, but these benefits have yet to be documented," Dr Hutchinson said.
Farmers in the US who cultivate GM maize with the Bt gene are encouraged to set aside plots of land adjacent to the GM fields where they grow conventional varieties of maize. This tactic helps to prevent the evolution of Bt-resistance in the corn borer moth, which is more likely to occur when the entire crop is genetically modified.