February 24, 2011

Global biotech crop acreage surpasses one billion hectares

Accumulated biotech crops exceeded one billion hectares in 2010, 15 years after commercialisation, according to Clive James, author of the annual report released by International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA).

The one billionth hectare was planted in 2010 by one of the 15.4 million farmers in 29 countries who now benefit from the technology. For comparison, one billion hectares is roughly equivalent to the vast land area of China, or of the US. With an unprecedented 87-fold increase between 1996 and 2010, biotech crops are the fastest-adopted crop technology in the history of modern agriculture, according to James, chairman and founder of ISAAA.

"Growth remains strong, with biotech hectarage increasing 14 million hectares - or 10% - between 2009 and 2010," said James. "That's the second highest annual hectare growth ever - bringing 2010 global plantings to 148 million hectares."

For the first time, in 2010, the ten largest biotech crop growing countries all had more than one million hectares in production, providing a broad and stable base for future growth. Ranked according to hectares, they include: the US (66.8 million), Brazil (25.4 million), Argentina (22.9 million), India (9.4 million), Canada (8.8 million), China (3.5 million), Paraguay (2.6 million), Pakistan (2.4 million), South Africa (2.2 million) and Uruguay (1.1 million).

For the second consecutive year, Brazil had the world's largest on-year increase in absolute biotech crop plantings, adding four million hectares in 2010 - a 19% increase - to grow a total of 25.4 million hectares. Only the US leads Brazil in total cropland devoted to biotech crops. Australia, which recovered from a multi-year drought, saw the largest proportional on-year increase in biotech crop plantings at 184%. Burkina Faso followed at 126% growth with 80,000 farmers planting 260,000 hectares, a 65% adoption rate.

Brazil, after expediting approvals of biotech crops (a total of 27, and eight in 2010 alone) and securing export trade agreements, now plants 17% of the world's biotech crops, according to Dr. Anderson Galvăo Gomes, director of Brazilian-based Celeres and contributor to the ISAAA report. Productivity increases attributed to biotech crops helped fuel Brazil's ability to double its annual grain production since 1990 while increasing cropland by only 27%. The benefits from biotech crops are spurring strong political will and substantial new R&D investments in biotech crops, with speed and effectiveness increasing access to technology, Gomes noted. With an ability to bring up to 100 million more hectares of cropland, with water, into production, Brazil will continue to be a driving force in the global adoption of biotech crops and is investing in infrastructure to support that growth.

"Developing countries grew 48% of global biotech crops in 2010 and will exceed industrialised nations in their plantings of biotech crops by 2015," said James. "Clearly, the countries of Latin America and Asia will drive the most dramatic increases in global hectares planted to biotech crops during the remainder of the technology's second decade of commercialization."

The five principal developing countries growing biotech crops - China, India, Brazil, Argentina and South Africa - planted 63 million hectares of biotech crops in 2010, equivalent to 43% of the global total. All told, 19 of the 29 countries that have adopted biotech crops are developing nations, which grew at a rate of 17% or 10.2 million hectares over 2009 compared to only 5% growth or 3.8 million hectares in industrialised countries.

More than 90% of biotech crop growers are small-scale farmers.