Monsanto Pakistan introduces bio-tech seed

[Hamartia Antidote]

I heard this bio engineered seed , destroyes the old genetic diversity in crops. And you have to 100% only buy the seed from the company forever, the plant itself does not gives you seed you can reuse from your harvest you have to always purchase a new batch in a endless cycle

Hey I'm a big organic food eater but there is slightly more to this than what you think. The farmers are not exactly guilt free here.

Basically farmers want a way of maximizing crops on their farmland. One of the issues is weeds. Weeds choke out crops.

*If* farmers want to maximize production on their farmland (they don't have to) they must utilize herbicides to kill the weeds. Unfortunately some weeds can only be killed by herbicides that also affect the crop plant. Farmers are in a dilemma. How to kill all the weeds without killing the crop?

Monsanto has created GMO seeds that are resistant to a particularly nasty herbicide called "RoundUp". If you spray your fields with RoundUp all the weeds will die but your crops will survive.

You can then densely pack your crop (which is unnatural) to maximize your land.

So what's the catch and why are farmers committing suicide?
The catch is that you have to buy these seeds every year. Big farms can afford them but maybe the little guys can't. So now the big farms grow more crops, cause the prices to come down, and the little farmer get even more squeezed. The cropland that used to pay his bills is now not enough.

So is Monsanto to blame? Well they provide a service (that big farms certainly don't complain about). Food prices at markets should be going down because of it. Is it nice...no. Is it progress...probably.

 

[litman]

they only need to transfer some amount in the bank accounts of our ruling parties and launch whatever they want in pak. GMOs will make us dependent on these companies even for food items. govt should act sensibly but we all know pakistani govts are neither sane nor loyal. may be i am wrong but i think first time these companies launch GMO food in pak was during musharraf era.

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

Also there is no fixed price for their seed , they might hike the price unexpectidly higher and the farming sector will Tank immediately.

I heard the other major problem is also the fact they actually sue legally farmers and folks get into contract with them and then decide to switch over due to financial problems

Just too much negative news on this company and its practices

The Genetically modified items are also harmful to many spices of "good insects such as bees" that help promote the spread of plant life naturally

I read quite a few articles on net massive amount of bees dieing across north america (which impacts eco system of plants , flower etc )

Very Risky avenue to introduce this company footprint into Pakistan

The Risk in agricultural sector is due to fact that many Pakistani farmers may not be fully aware of what exactly is Monsato "Genetically Modified Seed" or plant life means or its impacts or future financial problems associated with the initial gain. Obviously the low literacy rate would mean the sector is suspect to abuse by such a corporation

 

[N.Siddiqui]

Monsanto is an evil cartel...should not be allowed in Pakistan. So is most of the GM, genetically modified food and seeds.

1- Monsanto GM seeds initially looks to be of superior quality with increase in per acreage like wheat but that is just the start of the cobweb, the trap.

2- Once you buy the seeds laced with special genetics, you need to buy/purchase Monsanto recommended and prepared pesticides during seedling and on the wheat crop, or any other crop with Monsanto seeds.

3- Then you need to buy the specially prepared Fertilizers, again a Monsanto company will supply the fertilizers, has to buy from them at any cost...the trap is complete and no escaping from them.

The BT cotton, which is a genetically modified cotton seed variety has reduced the cotton production in Pakistan, actually. Earlier mention of more than 200,000 farmers suicides in India due to Monsanto is also true. So it's a big evil cartel, need to be aware of this and stop them taking any foothold in Pakistan, will try to bribe their way in through government.

 

[XenoEnsi-14]

Monsanto is in Pakistan

The one time you need Mullahs and they're nowhere to be found.

 

[brokk]

The catch is that you have to buy these seeds every year. Big farms can afford them but maybe the little guys can't. So now the big farms grow more crops, cause the prices to come down, and the little farmer get even more squeezed. The cropland that used to pay his bills is now not enough.

This is the part that I don't really grasp, so doesn't any 'Monsanto' seed plant produce seeds that can be used the following years? I could understand them going holy-moly WTF in the US to protect their patent and all, but surely in Pakistan this isn't applicable in the grand scheme of things or is it?

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

The seed is treated as a licensed product , you have to rebuy it again from the company itself. There must be a mechanism which prevents the farmer from developing his own seed stock

I think documentaries that I watched showed they sued farmers who they suspected started to shift back to old brands or alternatives.

But biggest lost is in bio diversity its like you are removing individual traits and making clones of 1 person over and over again, or if a super bug emerges it might kills all of these clone items. In Evolutionary term if a mass wipe out happens still 1-2 branches survive in plants they continue to evolve and get better over time beocome 100 distinct branches ...

Using clone plants sure you get the yeild but you loos the diversity and natural selection process

 

[brokk]

The seed is treated as a licensed product , you have to rebuy it again from the company itself. There must be a mechanism which prevents the farmer from developing his own seed stock

I also think so, but they do sue people whose fields are accidentally pollinated with their crops.. and why would some countries let them sue their farmers destroying lives to me seems crazy.

Besides yield, some documentaries show that some of these plants aren't edible until processed. (industrial corn : US : link, the documentary was King Corn).

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Also there is no fixed price for their seed , they might hike the price unexpectidly higher and the farming sector will Tank immediately.

I heard the other major problem is also the fact they actually sue legally farmers and folks get into contract with them and then decide to switch over due to financial problems

Just too much negative news on this company and its practices

The Genetically modified items are also harmful to many spices of "good insects such as bees" that help promote the spread of plant life naturally

I read quite a few articles on net massive amount of bees dieing across north america (which impacts eco system of plants , flower etc )

Very Risky avenue to introduce this company footprint into Pakistan

The Risk in agricultural sector is due to fact that many Pakistani farmers may not be fully aware of what exactly is Monsato "Genetically Modified Seed" or plant life means or its impacts or future financial problems associated with the initial gain. Obviously the low literacy rate would mean the sector is suspect to abuse by such a corporation

If they hike the price of the seeds...just simply don't buy them...go back to non-roundup seeds (like you have been doing for centuries)....problem solved. The US is going more and more organic every year. The problem is you'll go back to the original problem of weeds and food prices will shoot back up. Organic foods are more than double the price of GMO ones due to weed issues.

GMO's don't hurt bees. They don't have some magic coating. People spraying neonictinoid pesticides (not herbicides) kill bees. Again back to the problem of farmers doing things to maximize their crop yields on their land at the expense of other farmers and the public health.

3- Then you need to buy the specially prepared Fertilizers, again a Monsanto company will supply the fertilizers, has to buy from them at any cost...the trap is complete and no escaping from them.

No you don't. GMO plants grow in the same soil as other plants. Monsanto does sell chemical fertilizers. It will improve the growth in all plants (including weeds) not just GMO ones.

The BT cotton, which is a genetically modified cotton seed variety has reduced the cotton production in Pakistan, actually. Earlier mention of more than 200,000 farmers suicides in India due to Monsanto is also true. So it's a big evil cartel, need to be aware of this and stop them taking any foothold in Pakistan, will try to bribe their way in through government.

BT Cotton is being discontinued because the pink bollworm is immune to the insecticide added through genetic modification by Monsanto to cut down on heavy aerial pesticide spraying (which tends to kill all insects).. You'll have to go back to another cotton seed and heavy pesticide spraying (which will kill butterfles, bees, etc). It's not like you get a joyous reprieve. It is actually worse. People simply don't want to understand all the little details.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

This is the part that I don't really grasp, so doesn't any 'Monsanto' seed plant produce seeds that can be used the following years? I could understand them going holy-moly WTF in the US to protect their patent and all, but surely in Pakistan this isn't applicable in the grand scheme of things or is it?

They do produce VERY viable seeds but part of the Monsanto contract you sign says basically
1) you can only use the seeds for your farm...for one growing season.
2) you can't resell it to others
3) you can't breed the plants so you can use their seeds for subsequent years

The reason is Monsanto doesn't want farmers to go into the seed breeding business themselves (with the GMO seeds Monsanto spent millions in R&D money to produce) and then sell it to all their neighbors. This is how all the notorious Monsanto lawsuits originate. Monsanto sells one farmer in an area the seeds. Goes back a year or two later and notices suddenly 500 farms around that guy are using their seeds (which obviously the first farmer bred and sold). Monsanto starts suing and people cry foul.

I'm sure they cut Pakistani farmers a deal compared to the US. But as you can see it is very easy (and very very very tempting) for farmers to abuse that deal.

BTW the country that produces the most of the nasty herbicide "RoundUp" that is used in conjunction with Monsanto's GM seeds is China. So Monsanto is not making a hefty profit on co-selling herbicides.

Other than smaller farmers getting squeezed I don't see what all the fuss is about Monsanto per se. As I said I am an organic food eater so I'm not for any pesticide/herbicide use. However if we have to feed this planet cheaply and efficiently...we don't have many good options.

BTW Monsanto does have "terminator" technology so plants don't create viable seeds...but they think it is a bad idea to release into the environment. Could be exploited as a bioweapon.

 

[sparten]

Right. Let's stop eating wheat. Corn. Bananas. Tomatos. Patatoes. Drinking milk from cows. All of those thing are not natural, they are as a result of traits selected by humans and encouraged through breeding. All GMO does is do this process at once, more reliably and cheaply.

And a large fraction and growing larger of our crops are cultivated by large commercial farms. They have been using these seeds for years. That ship has sailed.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

And a large fraction and growing larger of our crops are cultivated by large commercial farms. They have been using these seeds for years. That ship has sailed.

It all comes down to what kind of agricultural business do you want. Do you want large farms that span to the horizon growing food densely with GMOs so consumers can buy food cheaper..at the expense of small farmers. Or individual farmers growing small plots, weeding by hand, and people paying higher prices.

Not a single weed...probably a GMO crop.

 

[sparten]

Lets see, produce more at lower prices versus produce less at higher, I wonder which will win in the end, oh yeah.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Lets see, produce more at lower prices versus produce less at higher, I wonder which will win in the end, oh yeah.

But...but...Monsanto is pure evil...they put the little farmer out of business.

 

[Secret Service]

who the f*** allowed them to come to Pakistan ?