Beyond GM crops: Course correction needed

Something is going wrong. At a time when India is committed to net-zero emissions by 2070, the policy response should focus on laying out a roadmap for chemical-free farming practices. But it is baffling to find senior officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare hobnobbing instead with industry echelons to see how to permit widespread application of the harmful herbicide, glyphosate, in cotton farming. 

It does not stop here. Reports say a dedicated committee is also examining the implications of approving the next generation of herbicide-tolerant genetically-modified cotton (HTBt). This comes at a time when the area under Bt cotton — the only approved genetically modified (GM) crop for commercial cultivation in India — has collapsed in Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan. With a decline of 46 per cent in cultivation, the cotton debacle in the northwest regions should have come as an eye-opener. On the contrary, it is bewildering to find that more of the same (in this case with an additional herbicide-tolerant gene) is being pushed as a possible solution. 

Such is the strong industry lobby, that instead of drawing any lessons from the destruction that the Bt cotton crop has inflicted on farmers (and the environment) and therefore requiring an immediate course correction, policymakers seem to be responding to industry pressure. The first shot came from Punjab, where the area under Bt cotton cultivation has dipped to its lowest. It still demanded that the Centre make available what the farmers popularly call Bt-3 seeds in the same series.

Knowing that Punjab farmers had received a severe blow from the failure of Bt cotton varieties — both Bt-1 and Bt- II (known as Bollgard) — over the years to combat the dreadful bollworm pests, so much so that it led to a large number of farmer suicides after the ruinous whitefly attack some years back, I thought Punjab should have been doubly careful.   

But even after having burnt its fingers, Punjab has not drawn any lessons. Neither have the policymakers at the national level.  

Now, before going any further, let us try to first understand what herbicide-tolerant GM cotton means. In simple words, it means an additional gene for herbicide tolerance has been inserted in the cotton variety — and in this case, for glyphosate — that dovetails the application of herbicides. This comes along with pesticide resistance that the promoters claim the new variety is equipped with. 

On the website of the Bayer company, which had earlier acquired Monsanto, it is stated that Bollgard-3 (or Bt-3 as farmers call it) comes with ‘three proteins that help protect your cotton plants against bollworm and other cotton pests’. It further adds that this wider spectrum of worm control can translate into fewer sprays and less potential damage to your cotton all season long.

Such is the hype over the performance of the earlier two strains of transgenic cotton, that the real facts have been very conveniently relegated to footnotes. In a paper published in Nature Plants journal (Mar 2020), K R Kranti, a former director of the Central Institute of Cotton Research at Nagpur and well-known anthropologist, Glenn Davis Stone from Washington University, had looked at the long-term impact of Bt cotton in India.

Their conclusion was that the transgenic cotton had performed poorly when it came to yield, and after an initial phase of reduction in pesticide use, the usage of chemicals actually soared. The production increase that India witnessed after the release of Bt cotton was actually because of an increase in major inputs like fertiliser and irrigation.

As for pesticide use, between 2002 and 2013, pesticide application on cotton rose by a whopping 93 per cent. Fertiliser usage increased by 58 per cent between 2004 and 2016. After 24 years of undertaking transgenic cotton cultivation, India ranks at 36 in yield performance among 70 countries. What shatters the myth of high yields resulting from Bt cotton cultivation is that most countries ahead of India actually do not grow GM varieties. 

Should that not be a lesson for policymakers to redesign cotton cultivation? And for that matter, should they not also see through the claims of high yield of GM mustard, which gives low yields compared with varieties that are already under cultivation? Thereby, should the focus not be strictly on ensuring long-term health and environmental impacts (without any drop in crop productivity), sure to emerge from a shift to climate-resilient farming practices? 

Need new approach

The dismal experience with Bt cotton shows the profound need to redraw the agricultural roadmap, which needs to be based on rediscovering the immense potential of climate-resilient traditional agriculture combined with appropriate technology. There are sustainable options available, but the Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR), which recently went into a research collaboration with the agribusiness giant Bayer, refuses to see the writing on the wall. 

More so, a landmark UN Biodiversity Agreement (COP 15) that concluded in December 2022, has specifically asked for the cutting down of the application of excess nutrients by 50 per cent and reducing the overall risk posed by pesticides and highly hazardous chemicals. This has to be attained by 2030. Moreover, new evidence shows strong scientific support for not only agro-ecology but also small-scale agriculture. Not only does it provide nature-friendly alternatives, but also acts as a powerful alternative to what agribusiness companies suggest.   

The United States has been largely focusing on GM crop yields to bolster food security (although there is no evidence globally of yield increases from commercially introduced transgenic crops). There is also an initial push to set up some pilot projects for GM corn and GM sugarcane to be used in ethanol production (also for dried distillers grains for animal feed), and also for GM soy and GM alfalfa hay fodder as low-hanging fruit that do not immediately go into the food chain, and therefore will receive public acceptance. Some discerning efforts are also being made to sneak in GM trees. But subsequently, these pilot project proposals will at least open the door for the final entry of GM food crops. 

Be warned. The twin strategy of pushing GM crops through a pliable bureaucracy and discrediting whistleblowers and other powerful voices to counter resistance to pesticides and GM crops in Asia, Africa and Latin America will be more pronounced in the days to come.

(Devinder Sharma is an agricultural economist and food and trade policy analyst)