New York: The rapid growth of Monsanto’s new GMO seeds resistant to the controversial herbicide dicamba has revived worries about the company’s stranglehold over farming during a period of industry consolidation. Long a producer of dicamba, Monsanto last year introduced genetically-modified cotton and soybean seeds that can resist the weed killer.
The products took off, amassing more than 20 per cent of US soybean fields and 50 per cent of US cotton fields in just two years, according to Monsanto data.
The seeds are popular because they boost yield on farms, and some consumers also use dicamba in their fields to get rid of weeds that have become resistant to other herbicides.
However, dicamba is controversial in the US farm belt amid complaints that neighbouring crops have been damaged by the herbicide.
Now some farmers say they are being forced to use the new GMO seeds to guard against dicamba.
Nathan Reed, a farmer in Marianna, Arkansas, whose crops were damaged by dicamba from fields more than two miles away, worries about his business. “We use overwhelmingly non GMOs, not because we are anti-GMO but because we found some niche markets,” Reed said at a public meeting last month. “We are in the business of making money, just like Monsanto is.”
“It is going to put that ability at risk for us,” he said. Farming states Missouri, Minnesota and North Dakota have imposed restrictions on dicamba, though they permit farmers to use the herbicide one or two times at the start of the season. — AFP
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