In lean times, biotech grains are less taboo

Soaring food prices and global grain shortages are bringing new pressures on governments, food companies and consumers to relax their longstanding resistance to genetically engineered crops.

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My Comment:

For the unsuspecting reader of the article, you would assume that GMO's (genetically modified organisms) are cheaper to grow. However, it is actually more expensive to grow genetically engineered corn and other GMO's.

From: http://www.keepmainefree.org/corn.html
Contention: “Genetic engineering ... will enable us to create more food more cheaply.”
Response: This much-toutd promise certainly hasn’t been borne out with the crop in question, Bt corn. The December 13, 2001 report, “When Does It Pay to Plant Bt Corn?” by Dr. Charles Benbrook, former Executive Director of the National Academy of Sciences Board of Agriculture, found that from 1996-2001, American farmers paid at least $659 million in price premiums to plant Bt corn, while boosting their harvest by only 276 million bushels-worth some $567 million in economic gain. The bottom line for farmers was a net loss of $92 million-about $1.31 per acre. Benbrook observed that the “jump in per acre seed expenditures with Bt corn is by far the biggest in history linked to a single new trait.” Good news for Monsanto, bad news for farmers.

From: http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/Newsletter/Jan06Un-SpinningtheSpinMasters/index.cfm
According to the April 13, 2005 Deccan Herald, “A study that tracked genetically modified Bt cotton crop for three years in Andhra Pradesh has proved conclusively that it has failed on all fronts including yield, cost of cultivation, returns to farmers and resistance to pests. On the other hand, the non-Bt cotton performed better on all counts.”[19] This was the only independent study “on Bt cotton done on [a] season-long basis continuously for three years in 87 villages.” Conducted by Dr Abdul Qayoom, former Joint Director of Agriculture in Andhra Pradesh, and Mr Sakkari Kiran of the Permaculture Institute of India, the study showed that growing Bt cotton cost 12% more, yielded 8.3% less, and the returns over three years were 60% less.[20]