The Rural Voice, 1999-02, Page 37Farmers need
benefits to buy
biotechnology
Farmcrs will decide, through their
willingness to buy products, the
future of such biotechnological
developments as the terminator gene,
Dr. Gordon Surgeoner of the
University of Guelph says.
Unless farmers are offered added
benefits for themselves in buying
genetically -engineered seed they're
unlikely to buy, Surgeoner told the
audience at Grey -Bruce Farmers'
Week Crops Day, January 6 in
Elmwood. Companies will have to
make itworthwhile for farmers to
buy a sced that they won't be able to
save and plant again.
"You're gong to be making
decisions based on agronomic
performance of these varieties that
may or may not have the terminator
gene. These will be your choices.
How do you pencil out how you are a
net benefiter or loser from these
technologies?"
The so-called "terminator gene"
has been patented by Delta Pine Land
Company in the United States
(working with the USDA) for use in
cotton and tobacco. By genetically
altering a plant, it will be possible to
let that plant produce seed, but keep
the seed from reproducing. Surgeoner
said the gene would be triggered by
treating the seed with a chemical to
switch off the gene that makes the
seed fertile. By using untreated seed,
the companies can still grow and
reproduce the seed. By treating seed
before selling it to farmers,
companies can prevent farmers from
keeping the seed and using it to plant
crops in subsequent years.
This has caused a lot of
controversy, Surgeoner said, because
it threatens the tradition of the farmer
being able to replant his own seed.
But in many cases this tradition has
already changed, he pointed out.
Traditional breeding, through
creating hybrids, has already
produced seeds farmers couldn't
replant. New technologies like BT
corn are only available to 'farmers
News
who will sign an agreement not to
save their seed.
Delta Pine Land Company calls it
a "technology protection gene", a
way of protccting its investment in
technology. Companies today may
invest $15-$30 million to develop
and get approval for a genetically -
altered seed variety and they have to
see a profit for that investment.
But while the most obvious
benefits arc to the company, there arc
other potential advantages, Surgeoner
said. For one thing, one of the
foremost concerns of critics of
biotechnology is that genetically -
altered plants might spread into the
environment. If their sccd was sterile,
the spread couldn't happen.
In wet years, farmers often have
trouble with sprouting in cereal
grains like wheat but if the seeds
were sterile, they couldn't sprout.
There arc still concerns on the part
of some people that the pollen' from
the crops could spread to other
plants, turning them sterile. So far
there is no evidence of this but thc
development is still in the very early
stages, Surgeoner said.
It will be years before Ontario
farmers have to make decisions about
seeds containing thc tcrminator gene,
Surgeoner predicted. "The quickest
(the process could be approved in the
U.S.) in cotton is probably 2005,
assuming everything goes correctly."
It's likely to be seven to 10 years
before varieties with the tcrminator
gene could be offered in Canada,
even if approval is given.
A major issue will be that farmers
continue to have choice in their sccd
purchases. The cost of biotechnology
has brought about a consolidation of
the seed breeding business into far
fewer companies than in the past.
The same situation applies to othcr
crop inputs, however, he pointed out
with fewer machinery companies,
fewer chemical companies and even,
possibly, fewer banks.
The public sector in Ontario,
mostly at the University of Guelph, is
concentrating its efforts on solving
problems specific to Ontario farms.
For instancc if alfalfa can be
genetically altered to make it less
suspectible to winter -kill it would be
a huge benefit. If wheat can he
altered to prevent fusarium problems,
farmers will gain.
Public sector researchers arc also
looking at minor -use crops such as
horticultural crops which the big
companies won't look at. Cold
tolerance in grapes or in tender fruits
could make a huge change in fruit
growing in Canada. Roundup -Ready
strawberries would allow growers a
better way to deal with gray, in their
strawberry crops.°
Pastures meet needs
of individual farms
Pasturing, once thought of as little
more than grass and good fences, has
become a sophisticated management
tool when designed to meet the needs
of thc individual farmer. That was the
message delivered by a pancl of
farmers taking part in the Grey -Bruce
Farmers' Wcck Crops Day.
The three farmers each had
different reasons for using intensive
pasturing practices. Bccf custom
grazer Gary Ballough of Teeswatcr
aims to get the most number of
pounds on the most number of cattle.
Beef producer Steve Eby of
Kincardine wants to use pasture in a
grower program to supply cattle for
the feeder operation run by him and
his father. They utilize a land hast
that's not suitable for row crops
because of lack of tile drainage.
Pasture is part of a health program
that gives thcm a minimum cost of
feed and minimum drugs costs, he
said.
Dairy producer Harvey Lyons of
Dundalk said in ordcr to pay for milk
quota he needed a systcm that had a
low capital cost and low operating
costs. He wants to get 55 per ccnt of
his milk production between May 15
.and October 15 when cattle are
eating cheaply on pasture.
Lyons milks 75-80 head during
the summer and 50-60 during the
winter. Cattle pasture on 90 primc
acres of thc 200 acre farm with a
further 25 acres of rough pasture and
55 acres of hay. There's a nearby 10()
acre farm for hay and grain. The
cattle get only dairy ration while they
are on pasture. No supplemental
FEBRUARY 1999 33