Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Not on the Brink of Collapse: GM Soy in the USA

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Today’s Sydney Morning Herald has a piece by Environment Writer Wendy Frew in which she quotes Dr Chuck Benbrook as follows:

“Across the south-eastern US, where soybean and cotton farmers have relied almost exclusively on (genetic engineering) technology for several years, the system is on the brink of collapse, the volume of herbicide used is setting new records and farmers’ profit margins are shrinking”.

Benbrook is visiting Australia for two weeks at the invitation of the organics industry to talk down GM, click here for more information on the tour.

I heard him on ABC Radio National’s Bush Telegraph Program yesterday, have the transcript from a press conference he gave in Canberra last Tuesday and I attended a talk he gave in Brisbane last Friday.

He generally focuses on soybeans, claiming that herbicide usage in soybeans initially dropped with the adoption of GM soy, but that usage subsequently increased with the advent of herbicide resistance and is now several time what it was before US farmers started growing GM soy.

Benbrook has stated that he uses official data, the data in reports that come out in May each year from the United States Department of Agriculture.

It is tedious extracting the information from these reports. I have spent much of this morning going thought the reports and extract figures on pesticide useage in soybean from here: http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/reports/nassr/field/pcp-bban/ and yield in soybeans from here http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/reports/nassr/other/pcu-bb/#field .

Based on this information I have constructed the following table:

SoyStatsBenbrookVGG.JPG

It would seem that with the advent of GM soy, the total amount of herbicide used on a per acre basis in the US has hardly changed and that the yield on a per acre basis has hardly changed.

The area planted to soybeans has increased with the 2004 USDA report stating that a total of 3.14 billion bushels of soybeans were harvested last year which is the largest soybean harvest in US crop history. This harvest also had the highest yield on record at 42.5 bushels/acre.

It is a bit hard to reconcile these figures with Benbrook’s ascertain that the industry is on the “brink of collapse” – see above quote from Sydney Morning Herald.

GM soy was first planted in 1996 and this year 87 percent of the total area planted to soybeans in the US has been planted to GM soy.

There has been no spectacular increase in yield or spectacular reduction in herbicide usage, but as Benbrook conceded in the interview on radio national yesterday, GM soy was developed to make weed control easier and facilitate use of the more environmentally-friendly herbicide glyphosate.

…………
I would really appreciate it if someone else when through and extracted the figures for cotton in the US – for both yield and herbicide usage.

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UPDATE 9.30pm (in Brisbane), 7TH DECEMBER 2005

Christopher Preston has extracted the cotton figures as follows. Thanks Chris!

cottonstatsbenbrook.JPG

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. rog says

    Tell me if and where I am wrong, if growing GM food was less profitable for farmers why would they continue with it?

    Are they being forced to grow GM product?

  2. jennifer says

    Some offline comment, that I will file here:

    Soy Crop Statistics:
    http://www.usda.gov/nass/pubs/stathigh/2005/stathighnar.htm

    http://www.cbot.com/cbot/pub/static/files/snd_cbt.pdf

    and

    I would say that a national average US soybean herbicide use figure is not necessarily the right statistic to go to war on – agree Benbrook has made that the battle ground, but it is an average of such a big range, soybeans are grown over from Texas to North Dakota – encountering very different farm sizes and weed populations etc. Also there are two critical factors to herbicide (or any pesticide) use – quantity and quality. Is a gram of cyanide safer or riskier than a kilo of salt? A discussion only about quantity misses a key part of the story. Hence Brookes figures for EIQ are helpful.

    Another critical point is that Benbrook is wrong about “across the SOUTH EASTERN US” one of the biggest impacts of Roundup Ready soybeans have been to expand soybeans northwards as the Roundup Ready system made them a more attractive crop to grow than wheat for farmers in North and South Dakota.

    See attached few slides from Prof Bill Wilson of North Dakota State University, presented at the AusBiotech conference a few weeks ago.

    Reasons are that soybeans always were an attractive cash crop, but the reliability and simplicity of the Roundup Ready system made them viable for prairie farmers. I may be missing some subtleties here, need to talk to Bill for more details.

  3. Boxer says

    Listening to the radio yesterday, I was left with the impression that Dr Benbrook had difficulty distinguishing between herbicide resistance in weeds on one hand and the GM, which relates to the soybeans. There is no evidence presented by Benbrook that if GM soybean was not in use that herbicide resistance would not have developed in any case. Herbicide resistance is an increasing problem in other crop systems that do not involve Roundup ready GM crops.

    I agree with your point about cyanide and salt. Glyphosate is a relatively safe product; the most dangerous component in roundup et al seems to be the wetting agent.

    Herbicide use may be unchanged in kg/ha, but some herbicides cost dollars per gramme and others cost dollars per kg. As Rog says, if the farmers continue with the GM soybeans, there may be an economic signal in there somewhere. Or it could be a capitalist conspiracy by that nasty Monsanto (spit).

  4. detribe says

    http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2005/12/ge-gm-expert-charles-benbrook-comments.html

    I’ve updated my GMP pundit Post above.

    Looking at the figures , the key point is that BOTH the last two harvest years, US average soybean yields per ha were record ever.
    2004 42.2 bu/acre
    2005 42.7 bu/ acre.

    The key point to check further is whether the drought that affected some states in 2005 was in the regions that Benbrook selects. If that is true, not only is Benbrook wrong he is dramatically misleading.

    See also
    http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2005/12/impact-of-gm-ge-crops-in-usa-2004.html

    for a report issuing Dec 6th 2005 from NCFAP Washington DC showing further extensive analysis contra Benbrook

  6. Roger Kalla says

    I was present at the Benbrook US GE flop show in Melbourne. Lots of what he said has been reported by others. However I picked up one point on why farmers in the US have switched over to RR soybeans. According to Benbrook when RR technology was introduced the price for Round up (of which glyphosate is the active ingredient) was reduced to 1/3 of the price. The total price of the package of the seed including the technology fee and herbicide was thus made very attractive to the US farmer. The environmental benefits of glyphosate over the other herbicides in use added additional incentive.

  7. detribe says

    Rogers last comment at least means one myth – that GM is a way for Monsanto to make huge profits out of Roundup is starting to die. (Probably it will survive in a few dark corners for a while though). With cheap Chinese glyphosate on the markets , Roundup can’t be very profitable.
    That reminds me:
    In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry,
    it’s the exact opposite.
    – Paul Dirac

  8. rog says

    Monsanto did originally apply for an extension to the patent and I believe some time was granted however the patent has now well and truly expired leaving the generic market open.

    There are some Monsanto Roundup variations, BiActive (frog friendly).

    The active ingredient, Glyphosate, has been tested over and over and over and is only harmful when drunk in large quantity undiluted. The wetting agent has been cited by some as the real villain as it is alleged that it can destroy bacteria and soil biota. In normal practice it is used in judiciously as it is another cost.

  9. jennifer says

    Please note, I have just updated this post with some cotton data from the USA – reread the original post. Cheers,

  10. detribe says

    This whole story is emerging a stunning deception of the Australian public.
    What, with record average soybean AND cotton yields per acre these last two seasons,
    http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2005/12/us-has-another-bumper-cotton-crop.html
    http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2005/12/ge-gm-expert-charles-benbrook-comments.html

    , Aussie newspapers and radio can still run these Benbrook stories without a critical “balancing” comment?

    Where’s the digging for evidence by journalist’s when you really need it! The blogosphere with guys in pajamas like me is starting to make a lot of sense.

    No wonder the need to constantly claim this guy is an advisor the three Presidents. What he’s been doing since 1997 is more to the point.
    GMO Pundit

  11. detribe says

    Let me also make the point that with rising yields per acre, the time trend of pesticide used per produce produced (eg per bushel, per bale) is relevant too, as with water use efficiency.

  12. Louis Hissink says

    Detribe,

    what gave you the idea that Aussie newspapers and radio are unbiassed? I have family working for Fairfax in Sydney and THEY think the UK Guardian is a conservative paper.

    Mind you Warwick had a vistor from the UK who averred that the Guardian was very flexible in its politial posturing.

    I don’t think of it is an overt act of deception, more of credulous fools possessing a smattering of science and then assuming they know it all. They actually believe this baloney – that is the problem.