Farmers want to grow Bt cotton

Harare Bureau
Farmers are urging government to conduct research on genetically modified Bt cotton to establish the advantages and disadvantages of the technology on the environment and humans. GM cotton is developed using bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) which naturally produces a chemical harmful only to a small fraction of insects like the bollworm.

Farmers say authorities are refusing to take Bt cotton on board on mere speculation and suspicon but there was no research to prove any dangers associated with the technology.

They argue that farmers in other countries were realising high yields at low cost from using Bt cotton.
In an interview with our correspondent this week, Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers Union president  Wonder Chabikwa said Bt cotton resisted bollworm, a pest that can drastically reduce yields.

“Farmers require high yields and low cost of production to maximise yields,” he said.
“Farmers in other countries are realising huge profits through growing Bt cotton. We are willing to use technology that reduces production costs and increases yields.

“Research should be carried out so that we can convince the nation on the GM material. So far we are not sure if GM products are safe to our health.”

Cotton Council spokesman Garikayi Msika said farmers were not demanding the introduction of Bt cotton but were advocating for intensive research to establish facts about the technology.

“We should do research on our own. We are speculating on things that we do not have adequate information on and it is dangerous to make such decisions,” he said.

“Bt enhances the crop to extract a certain element from the soil. The elements are already there in the soil and there is no new element being engineered.”
Msika said there were various forms of Bt elements.

“Some people suspect that Bt cotton is being promoted by Europeans and could be a brainchild of European companies that want to profiteer in Africa,” he said.

“But we have other countries like China that are friendly to us and we can collaborate with them in our research.”
Malawi is carrying out research on Bt cotton to reduce the effect of bollworm on yields.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development is on record saying that local farmers could boost yields using local varieties and would not want to contaminate its varieties by growing GM seed.