Monsanto GM-corn harvest fails massively in South Africa
Mar 29, 2009
South African farmers suffered millions of dollars in lost income when 82,000 hectares of genetically-manipulated corn (maize) failed to produce hardly any seeds.The plants look lush and healthy from the outside. Monsanto has offered compensation.
Monsanto blames
the failure of the three varieties of corn planted on these farms, in three
South African provinces,on alleged 'underfertilisation processes in the
laboratory". Some 280 of the 1,000 farmers who planted the three varieties of
Monsanto corn this year, have reported extensive seedless corn problems.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/270101
Urgent investigation demanded
However environmental activitist
Marian Mayet, director of the Africa-centre for biosecurity in Johannesburg,
demands an urgent government investigation and an immediate ban on all GM-foods,
blaming the crop failure on Monsanto's genetically-manipulated technology.
Willem Pelser, journalist of the
Afrikaans Sunday paper Rapport, writes from Nelspruit that
Monsanto has immediately
offered the farmers compensation in three provinces - North West, Free State and
Mpumalanga. The damage-estimates are being undertaken right now by the local
farmers' cooperative, Grain-SA. Monsanto claims that 'less than 25%' of three
different corn varieties were 'insufficiently fertilised in the laboratory'.
80% crop failure
However Mayet says Monsanto was
grossly understating the problem.According to her own information, some farms
have suffered up to 80% crop failures. The centre is strongly opposed to GM-food
and biologically-manipulated technology in general.
"Monsanto says they just made a
mistake in the laboratory, however we say that biotechnology is a failure.You
cannot make a 'mistake' with three different varieties of corn.'
Demands urgent
government investigation:
"We have been warning against
GM-technology for years, we have been warning Monsanto that there will be
problems,' said Mayet. She calls for an urgent government investigation and an
immediate ban on all GM-foods in South Africa.
Of the 1,000 South African
farmers who planted Monsanto's GM-maize this year, 280 suffered extensive crop
failure, writes Rapport.
Monsanto's local spokeswoman
Magda du Toit said the 'company is engaged in establishing the exact extent of
the damage on the farms'. She did not want to speculate on the extent of the
financial losses suffered right now.
Managing director of Monsanto in
Africa, Kobus Lindeque, said however that 'less than 25% of the Monsanto-seeded
farms are involved in the loss'. He says there will be 'a review of the
seed-production methods of the three varieties involved in the failure, and we
will made the necessary adjustments.'
He denied that the problem was
caused in any way by 'bio-technology'. Instead, there had been 'insufficient
fertilisation during the seed-production process'.
And Grain-SA's Nico Hawkins says
they 'are still support GM-technology; 'We will support any technology which
will improve production.'
see
He also they were 'satisfied
with Monsanto's handling of the case,' and said Grain-SA was 'closely involved
in the claims-adjustment methodology' between the farmers and Monsanto.
Farmers told Rapport that
Monsanto was 'bending over backwards to try and accommodate them in solving the
problem.
"It's a very good gesture to
immediately offer to compensate the farmers for losses they suffered,' said
Kobus van Coller, one of the Free State farmers who discovered that his maize
cobs were practically seedless this week.
"One can't see from the outside
whether a plant is unseeded. One must open up the cob leaves to establish the
problem,' he said. The seedless cobs show no sign of disease or any kind of
fungus. They just have very few seeds, often none at all.
The South African
supermarket-chain Woolworths already banned GM-foods from its shelves in 2000.
However South African farmers have been producing GM-corn for years: they were
among the first countries other than the United States to start using the
Monsanto products.
The South African government
does not require any labelling of GM-foods. Corn is the main staple food for
South Africa's 48-million people.
The three maize varieties which
failed to produce seeds were designed with a built-in resistance to
weed-killers, and manipulated to increase yields per hectare, Rapport
writes.
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