February 9, 2010

 

China ecologist warns on foreign GM seeds

There are concerns that China may lose control of its food supply if it relies on foreign genetically modified (GM) crops.

 

Through monopoly status, foreign suppliers can raise seed prices and drive hundreds of millions of Chinese farmers bankrupt and trigger social unrest, according to Jiang Gaoming, an ecologist at the Institute of Botany under the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

 

China should draw lessons from the impact of foreign GM soy, and must control foreign GM seeds entering the Chinese market, Jiang said.

 

China went from a major soy producer to the largest soy importer in 2002 when it abolished an import quota and tariff on soy. China imported a total of 42.6 million tonnes of soy in 2009, up 14% over 2008. Chinese customs data shows 97.4% of the soy were imported from the US, Brazil and Argentina.

 

So far there is no scientific proof of the potential harm of genetically modified food. But genetic modification cannot necessarily contribute to an increase in crop output, said Fang Lifeng, director of Greenpeace's agriculture and food programme.

 

Some GM cotton shows "minor" problems at the seventh year of planting, said Du Jianjun, manager of a seeding company based in Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province.

 

Fang said that genetically modified cotton can resist bollworms but is vulnerable to other kind of pests, which leads to increased costs for other pesticides and pollution after years of planting, based on Greenpeace's field visit to cotton farmers in Yancheng, Jiangsu Province.

 

Unlike the US and Argentina where large farm areas are suited for the use of machinery, much of China's farmland is scattered, and herbicide-resistant GM crops do not save costs for Chinese farmers.

 

"Genetically modified seeds are normally priced two to four times more than non-genetically modified seeds, eroding farmers' income," Fang said.

 

So far only two GM crops, cotton and papaya, are allowed to be planted in China, Fang said. He added that the Ministry of Agriculture last November granted safety certificates to two types of GM rice and one type of GM corn without giving information on food and environmental safety, or the timetable for final commercialisation of the GM crops.

 

Genetically modified technology in grain might play an important role in China's grain output, as China is short of arable land, said Weng Ming, a researcher at the Institute of Rural Development of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.