FARMERS ABANDONING GMO SEEDS… NOW WAIT FOR IT: A NEW GOVERNMENT “POLICY” WILL BE PUSHED
While we’re on the subject of GMOs once again, there has been another quiet story unfolding, one that you obviously won’t see on Faux News, SeeB.S., SeeNoNews(CNN), and the media network shills for mercantilist America: farmers, it seems, are abandoning GMOs in growing numbers, and the reason is rather interesting:Farmers Abandoning GMO Seeds and the Reason Will Surprise You
In case you missed it: here’s the core of the reason, or rather, core reasons(Note the plural):
“A growing number of farmers are abandoning genetically modified seeds, but it’s not because they are ideologically opposed to the industry.Now there are a number of hit-the-palm-on-the-forehead-and-exclaim-”Doh!”-Homer-Simpson moments here.
“Simply put, they say non-GMO crops are more productive and profitable.
“Modern Farmer magazine discovered that there is a movement among farmers abandoning genetically modified organisms (GMO) because of simple economics.
“’We get the same or better yields, and we save money up front,’ crop consultant and farmer Aaron Bloom said of non-GMO seeds. Bloom has been experimenting with non-GMO seeds for five years and he has discovered that non-GMO is more profitable.
“The re-converts to non-GMO seeds are not hippies but conservative Midwestern farmers who are making a business decision, Modern Farmer discovered. They are switching back to natural seed because it is more profitable — not because of any ideology.”
“Five years ago the [GMO seeds] worked,” said farmer Christ Huegerich, who along with his father planted GMO seeds. “I didn’t have corn rootworm because of the Bt gene, and I used less pesticide. Now, the worms are adjusting, and the weeds are resistant. Mother Nature adapts.”
Homer Simpson moment number one: Nature appears to adapt faster than agribusiness corporations can adapt their GMOs, and hence
(Homer Simpson moment number two) while in the short run GMOs appear to increase profits and productivity, in the long run productivity declines, expenses rise as farmers have to purchase additional pest controls in addition to the already-more-costly GMOs, and hence
(Homer Simpson moment number three) production and profitability decline and hence
(Homer Simpson moment number four) it’s more profitable and productive to plant the non-GMO seeds over the long run.
Or to put it corn-and-country simple:
“The Modern Farmer article, called The Post GMO-Economy, makes an excellent case for farmers dumping GMO. Some of the interesting facts the magazine uncovered include:
- “The cost of growing one acre of non-GMO corn was $680.95, the cost of growing an acre of GMO corn was $761.80 according to Aaron Bloom. That means it costs $80.85 more an acre to raise GMO corn.
- “GMO seeds can cost up to $150 a bag more than regular seeds.
- “The market for non-GMO foods has grown from $1.3 billion in 2011 to $3.1 billion in 2013, partially because some Asian and European countries don’t want GMO seeds.
- “Grain dealer Clarkson Grain pays farmers an extra $2 a bushel for non-GMO soybeans and an additional $1 a bushel for non-GMO corn.
- “The market for non-GMO seed is growing. Sales at Spectrum Seed Solutions, which sells non-GMO seed, have doubled every year for the last four years. Sales at another company that markets non-GMO seeds, eMerge Genetics of West Des Moines, Iowa, have increased by 30 percent a year for five years.
- “Spectrum Seed Solutions president Scott Odle thinks that non-GMO corn could be 20 percent of the market in five years.”
But if Modern Farmer magazine is correct, then the products are not substantially equivalent on the two crucial points of profitability and producivity for the local farmer.
This is probably not the sort of news those shareholders of Mon(ster)santo were hoping to hear.
We can predict the sort of mercantilist response already: agribusiness will lobby for “stricter regulation” of farm products, and that will be code for more regulation imposed on non-GMO products while “substantial equivalence” will continue to be the order of the day for goobernment agencies. Such calls will, of course, be tucked into “farm subsidy bills” (want a subsidy? plant GMOs! don’t ask questions!) and the pockets of corrupt politicians in the large agriculture states will be lined with agribusiness money, and of course, for the recalcitrant, middle-of-the night phone calls and threatened blackmail. (And if you think I’m joking, read Engdahl’s book!)
And that’s the lie of course, of modern corporate America, for it isn’t about markets, it’s about mercantilism and corporate protection from the markets, for the farmers mentioned in the Modern Farmer article have already made the appropriate market-based decision.
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