The Rural Voice, 2005-02, Page 26Rights laws have increasingly
restricted our rights will know that
any farmer privilege is only a
temporary concession. Farmers need
to draw a line in the sand and say a
resounding no to any further
restrictions on our traditional
practices of seed usage", said Boehm.
But Paul Steckle, MP for Huron
Bruce and chair of the House of
Commons Agriculture and Food
committee says information he has
received from the Grain Growers of
Canada, a coalition of farm
commodities, is that they support the
proposed amendments. The proposals
protect the rights of farmers to keep
their own seed, he said, though not
their right to sell that seed to others
without permission of the patent
holder.
"There's a lot of myths about
what's going on out there," he says
of the worries being expressed that
farmers will lose their right to keep
and plant their own seed. "It's
nothing of that sort."
Steckle accuses "some groups" of
stirring up fears to get attention.
While the proposed
amendments are not
coming from the
government Steckle expects that if
they are introduced as legislation his
committee will examine the issue. "It
(the act) has some pretty big
ramifications. We need to have the
facts on the record."
The facts, according to Leask are
that the new legislation would add
"clarity" to the legislation when it
comes to the ability of farmers to buy
seed from a variety of sources and
save enough to plant their crops the
following year. "It doesn't change
anything."
Leask says it would be a violation
under the proposed amendments,
however, for farmers to save a
certified seed and sell it for
commercial purposes to another
Open -pollinated corn: back to the future?
Victor Kucyk worked in the
main stream seed industry
working with different crops
but took a different tack when he
began operating his Dublin -area
farm and looked for a sideline. He
turned to selling open -pollinated
corn varieties.
"The phone bills were
horrendous" he says of the early
days as he called all over North
America tracking down sources of
open -pollinated varieties. "It's taken
on a life of its own," he says of the
way he's talking to someone and
gets a lead on a new source.
He has become a passionate
promoter of the value of open -
pollinated varieties for those
growing corn for human
consumption or for livestock. While
open -pollinated corn can't match the
production volume of hybrids for
cash crop farmers, whose aim is the
maximize volume, tests show that
the protein level in these varieties is
higher than hybrids. The reason so
much soybean meal is needed in
feed today is because protein levels
have been sacrificed for higher
yields, Kucyk maintains.
Protein tests done on open -
pollinated varieties show protein
levels of 11-13 per cent while hybrid
protein typically measures 8-9.5 per
cent, he says. However because of
the high use of nitrogen fertilizers
those proteins in hybrids may be
false positives and protein levels
may be about 8 per cent and
bioavailability may be, lower again,
giving open -pollinated corn a huge
nutritional advantage by his
calculations.
He has anecdotal evidence of
livestock producers who, after a
number of years of feeding higher -
protein, open -pollinated corn can
feed their animals 20 per cent less
and still have them produce 20 per
cent more.
What's more, Kucyk is trying to
increase the protein content of his
corn, aiming for 18-20 per cent
protein. "We're going against the
grain," he says.
While hybrids mean there is an
identical genetic structure in the
entire population of a corn field,
giving great uniformity, open -
pollinated varieties have a diverse
genetic makeup.
"We're going the other way,"
Kucyk says. "Every plant is
different." But it offers a chance to
see the plant adapt to the specific
conditions of the farm or field or to
develop resistance to disease.
Kucyk is constantly looking at
plants from the 100 varieties he
grows and estimates he'll look at a
million plants a season. He's
working, for instance, with a white -
kernel variety for the food -grade
market and varieties that can
actually mature in 50-55 days.
There are about a dozen people
across North America working with
varieties that date back 100-150
years, he estimates. (By comparison,
a hybrid variety generally lasts only
three or four years before being
replaced.) "We have to be our own
gene bank," Kucyk says.
If we arewhat we eat, he argues,
genetic modifications like inclusion
of the Bt gene in corn cause
potential problems for some
members of society. By including
the toxin in the genetic structure of
the plant it will be part of the whole
plant including the seed.
Theoretically this isn't a problem for
humans and animals with an acid
stomach but there are people whose
stomach contents are not so acidic
because of health problems and the
heavy use of antacids means some
people may actually have neutral
stomach chemistry.
Open -pollinated varieties don't
like to be at close quarters so he
recommends a plant population of
18,000 to 20,000 plants per acre,
compared to 25,000 for hybrids. It
means a $100 bag of seed for an
open pollinated variety will plant 4-
4.5 acres a cost of $20 to $25 an
acre.
He also has no problem with
farmers saving their own seed. "We
don't own the corn," he says. "If
anyone has the right to ownership its
the indigenous people." He points
out that corn, rice, tomatoes and
potatoes all owe their domestication
and development to native peoples.
The more people saving seed the
more the varieties are protected. In
the past there have been huge losses
in genetic diversity.
"It's a passion," Kucyk says.
"This interests me."0
22 THE RURAL VOICE