Jul 08, 2010 (St. Louis Post-Dispatch - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- American farmers continued planting more genetically engineered crops this year, surprising some industry experts who expected farmers to back away from some biotech crops amid complaints of high seed prices and reports of growing weed resistance.
This spring the percentage of genetically engineered soy, corn and cotton rose, helping push total planting of all three crops up over last year and lifting soy to record-breaking levels and corn to near-record breaking levels.
According to a report issued last week by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, farmers cited good weather conditions in the spring planting season as the primary reason for the overall increases.
For some analysts, however, the biotech figures were unexpected. Since the first biotech crops were commercialized in 1996, planting of biotech soy, corn and cotton have climbed consistently. But last year acreage of biotech soybeans dropped by 1 percent, making 2009 the first year farmers appeared to be backing away from biotech soy varieties, a trend many agricultural analysts expected to continue.
"I think there were two reasons why," said Neil Harl, a professor of economics at Iowa State University. "One was the rapid run-up in cost (of seeds). The second was resistance by weeds to glyphosate."
More than 90 percent of the soybeans grown in the U.S. are genetically engineered to withstand applications of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, the country's top-selling herbicide. Creve Coeur-based seed giant Monsanto owns the technology in the majority of the country's soybeans and also manufactures Roundup. The two products work in tandem.
But in the past few years, the weeds that glyphosate kills have been cropping up in farm fields, particularly in the South. And the price of soybean seeds has risen sharply -- more than 100 percent since 2001, according to federal figures. That has made some farmers turn away from biotech varieties or think about doing so, seed dealers and farmers say.
"Farmers have balked because they say it's just too high," said Grover Shannon, a professor of soybean genetics at the University of Missouri's Delta Center. "They're charging this big price and the product doesn't work as well."
Monsanto concedes that it may have been overly optimistic about Roundup's efficacy over the long term. Now the company is recommending residual herbicides, including a product for cotton and soybeans called Warrant that the company launched last week for the 2011 season.
The company also said it was giving farmers the option of buying a non-treated version of its new generation of soybean, called Roundup Ready 2 Yield. This could lower the cost and attract more farmers as they make their seed purchases this fall -- something that could boost the biotech acreage even higher next year.
In the meantime, this year's rise in biotech acreage comes as welcome news for the world's largest seed company. The biotech giant became the subject late last year of a Department of Justice investigation into anti-competitive behavior. Late last month, the attorney general of West Virginia accused the company of claiming that Roundup Ready 2 Yield performs better than it actually does.
Monsanto has long countered by saying that its licensing practices, which allow hundreds of companies to sell seeds with Monsanto-developed traits, give more farmers access to its technologies. The company has also stood by its testing showing that its new soybeans yielded more than 7 percent over competitors'.
Still, researchers at public universities say they are continuing to work on developing conventional seed varieties to fulfill what they believe could be growing demand.
