Visit to Farms and Elevator

Weslaco, Texas, USA

6 April, 2006

In 2005, genetically modified (GM) crops occupied 49.8 million hectares in the USA. This involved the cultivation of soybean, corn, cotton, canola, squash, and papaya. Although, resistance to GM crops is not new even in the USA, farmers are increasingly adopting this technology.

Visits to a few farms around Weslaco in Texas proved that farmers in the USA are well educated on the technology and all of them have the liberty to choose what they want to grow in their farms. I had an opportunity to speak to an organic grower who welcomes the technology but chose to go the organic way due to the market demand and the higher price of the organic produce.

Given the situation that farmers have a choice on GM crops, best practice and coexistence is widely accepted and practiced by farmers here. Some of the common measures employed are separation of crops by space and time, communicating with neighbors, use of good husbandry, harvest and storage practices. With these measures in place, GM crops co-exist successfully with conventional and organic crops.

A sound coexistence practice is important to ensure minimal adventitious presence of unwanted material especially GM derived material. It is unrealistic to expect 100% purity for any crop and this is why thresholds are set for adventitious presence of unwanted material.

It is a very common scenario here, where farmers grow GM and non-GM crops in the same farm at the same time. Whether GM and non-GM crops are grown in the same farm or in the neighboring or adjacent farms, the coexistence practices that have been established seem to be successfully implemented and the results have been satisfactory.

A visit to a local elevator displays a system that operates by high volume and low cost. Once harvested, commodity crops are trucked in bulk from the farm to a local primary elevator, which assembles crops produced by many farmers. These facilities weigh, clean, grade, blend and assemble the commodities for bulk shipment. Some elevators are high throughput elevators with a storage capacity up to 20,000 metric tons of grain.

Due to the huge volume handled by these elevators, it is impossible to keep varieties completely separate in the bulk handling system.

Mahaletchumy Arujanan

Program Director
Malaysian Biotechnology Information Centre (MABIC)