Waking up to GM cotton

There is no sign as yet of the thriving crop of genetically modified cotton in Gujarat, introduced illegally by a small player in the field of seed development in a cowboy act, being torched or the germplasm in question being destroyed.

THE issue of whether GM (genetically modified) crops should be allowed into Indian agriculture has been the subject of a fierce public debate over the last five years. The debate has been both informed and wide-ranging and has been joined by scientists, scientific institutions, government spokespersons, environmentalists, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), farmers' organisations and political parties. From those who are totally against the introduction of transgenic crops in any form in agriculture, to those who advocate opening the Indian agricultural sector to unregulated imports, whether of transgenic seeds, crops or other agricultural products, the entire spectrum of public opinion has found articulation. The debate has also included a carefully considered middle position. Many scientists from Indian research institutes, for example, have for long warned of the irreparable damage that the unregulated entry of transgenic germplasm could cause to Indian agriculture. They have urged the government to put in place strong regulatory controls to prevent the smuggling of transgenic germplasm into the country, as well as the smuggling of rare germplasm out of the country for commercial purposes.

Although indications are that it is only a matter of time before the Indian government permits the use of transgenics in agriculture, as of today the use of genetically engineered germplasm in agriculture is technically banned in India. It was only in June that the Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Company Ltd. (Mahyco) was refused environmental clearance by the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) for the commercial planting of its transgenic Bt cotton variety. The GEAC is a statutory body that gives approvals for large-scale releases and commercialisation of GM organisms, set up by the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) under the Environment Protection Act (EPA), 1986. Mahyco and its associate Monsanto, the life science multinational that has a 26 per cent shareholding in Mahyco, were directed to conduct large-scale field trials for another year to test for a specified set of environmental parameters.

Even as the debate on GM crops raged in the public domain, and the government set up a regulatory and monitoring system for the anticipated entry of GM crops into Indian agriculture, a little known Gujarat company had quietly jumped the gun. It allegedly sourced transgenic Bt cotton seeds from the United States, crossed them with local varieties and, in the 2000 kharif season, put them on the market for sale. The cotton crop from seeds sold under the brand name Navbharat-151, produced and marketed by Navbharat Seeds, a private limited company started by Dr. D.B. Desai, a plant-breeder with a U.S. university degree, has tested positive for the genetically engineered Cry1Ac gene. The tests were carried out by a two-member team sent by the MoEF, following reports that a particularly hardy and high-yielding cotton variety contained transgenic properties. The team, which tested samples from six locations before coming to its conclusions, consisted of Dr. C.D. Mayee, Director, Central Institute of Cotton Research, Nagpur, and Dr. T.V. Ramanaiah from the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), New Delhi. It was clear that the government's regulatory and monitoring structure, consisting of a many-tiered, inter-ministerial set-up that was also to put in place mechanisms to prevent the illegal entry of genetically manipulated germplasm into the country, had been caught off guard.

Once it was confirmed that Navbharat-151 contained genetically engineered genes, the GEAC, on October 18, issued an unprecedented order to the Gujarat government. Quoting from clauses 7 and 8 of the Rules framed under the EPA, which forbid the import or export of any germplasm without its approval, and from Section 15(2) of the EPA, the GEAC directed the Gujarat State Biotechnology Coordination Committee to uproot the standing crop of Navbharat-151 hybrid cotton and destroy it by burning. The GEAC also ordered that the cotton and seeds already harvested by farmers from Navbharat-151 should be burnt; that seed production plots and harvested seeds be destroyed; and that all breeding lines, hybrids, plucked cotton bolls and all other breeding material with the company be destroyed. According to the GEAC's estimates, the area bearing transgenic cotton is roughly 4,000 hectares of the 17,000 lakh hectares under cotton in the State, and is mainly restricted to the cotton belt of Mehasana, Amreli, Rajkot and Bharuch districts. Two pluckings of cotton bolls had already been completed by farmers. According to the GEAC, Navbharat Seeds is also engaged in seed production in Andhra Pradesh where Navbharat-151 is sold under the names Jay, Vijay and Digvijay.

Although stunned by a directive that virtually asked it to torch the thriving cotton fields of farmers in its State, the Gujarat government reacted cautiously. It did not openly defy the order, but quietly made it clear that there was no question of pursuing this extreme course of action. "Our Chief Minister has made it clear that we will safeguard the interests of our farmers who have not committed any fault," a senior officer in the State Agriculture Ministry told Frontline. "We are expecting a bumper cotton crop of 36 to 38 lakh bales of cotton this year in the State, despite the unprecedented bollworm infestation. What kind of signal will the burning of the crops of innocent farmers send to the farming community? In any case, 80 per cent of the harvest from the Navbharat-151 seeds has already reached the market as it is an early flowering variety." This is the second season in which Navbharat-151 is being marketed. In addition to buying new seeds, farmers are also believed to have saved seeds from the previous year's crop. The company's literature on the variety claims that it has the potential to yield 22 quintals an acre, as against 6 to 8 quintals for the standard varieties. Apart from showing resistance to the bollworm pest, the variety has a shorter duration of 140 to 150 days as against 180 to 190 in the case of other varieties. The first complaints against Navbharat Seeds Pvt Ltd came from rival seed companies. It was found that while other varieties succumbed to bollworm infestation, Navbharat-151 cotton not only remained unaffected but did not even require pesticide spraying.

"The State government has suggested to the GEAC that the plants be spared and the seeds destroyed," P.K. Ghosh, Principal Secretary, Department of Environment and Forests, Gujarat, told Frontline. "Since the Navbharat-151 variety flowered early this season, we have told our farmers and collectors to collect the seeds where possible both from the fields and the ginning units." According to Ghosh, the licences of dealers who sold the seeds have been cancelled, and the company has been blacklisted. "We have collected whatever germplasm we could from Navbharat's farm in Nadiad. The managing director of the company has been dropped from all government committees," he said. But the State government is just too late in its attempts to bolt the stable doors: Navbharat-151 has been in the market now for two years, and even retrieving Bt cotton germplasm from the Navbharat source this year is realistically impossible.

The GEAC, after a meeting with officials of the Gujarat government on October 31, modified its earlier order. The sheer impracticality of enforcing its rather draconian directive may have been the reason for the climbdown. In its fresh order, the GEAC directed the State government to retrieve to the extent possible the cotton that may have already reached the market, destroy the seeds and store the lint; procure at support prices the cotton bolls from the remaining standing crop from the fields and from farmers' storage places; take steps to prevent the use of Navbharat-151 seeds; and ensure the uprooting and complete destruction of the crop residue. The GEAC also directed the Government of Andhra Pradesh to stop the seed production and multiplication programme of Navbharat-151.

IN response to the October 18 GEAC order, D.B. Desai filed a writ petition in the Delhi High Court asking for a stay on the order. (The court decision was still awaited at the time of writing.) According to sources in the GEAC, Desai in his submission said that he was unaware of the presence of the Cry1Ac gene in Navbharat-151, a variety he claimed he developed through the traditional hybridisation method. He reportedly stated that he acquired the original seed from a Maharashtra breeder (whom he did not name). He then crossed the original germplasm with local varieties. He claimed he did not have the sophisticated equipment and facilities necessary for testing the transgenic properties in the seed. The Navbharat-151 variety was developed not only to make the cotton crop resistant to the bollworm pest but to shorten the growing season of cotton so that the land could be freed for the cultivation of other crops.

There are no takers for Desai's explanations from within the GEAC. "Desai may have used the traditional hybridisation method to develop the variety, but he could not have been unaware of the fact that the original germplasm was genetically engineered," Dr. P.K. Ghosh, Adviser, DBT, and Member, GEAC, said. "He has worked on developing the seed for at least three years prior to putting it on the market. From our tests we have determined that in this time he has done a minimum of two crossings."

Ever since the crisis broke, the GEAC has come under considerable criticism. The seed industry, impatient to be allowed to use transgenic seeds, which have tremendous commercial advantages, feel that this could have been averted if only the GEAC had not delayed the clearance for the commercialisation of cotton transgenics. Cotton farmers, who have inadvertently planted transgenic cotton, see as an outrage the order to destroy a perfectly healthy cotton crop with no guarantee of compensation. The State government is unlikely to comply with an order that will result in a face-off with a constituency it can ill-afford to alienate. Such criticism does not of course take into account the long-term problems that could attend the commercialisation of transgenics particularly if the process of scientific testing and monitoring, mandatory in all countries where GM crops have been introduced, are not strictly adhered to. What theoretically is the damage that the unregulated entry of a Bt cotton variety, Navbharat-151 for example, could inflict? "Since this is unauthorised and unregulated, there are serious issues that arise from the environmental and food-safety angle," Ghosh said. "This does not concern the gene alone but the environment in which it operates. There are many things we just do not know. For example, how much Cry1Ac protein does the Cry1Ac gene produce over a period of 140 days? Does it create the required resistance in the plant to bollworm in the Indian environment? We don't know that."

Mahyco, a company whose interests, at least in the short run, have been directly hit by the illegal marketing of Bt cotton hybrids, has called for strong action against Navbharat Seeds. It claims that it learned in mid-September that a seed company in Gujarat was marketing hybrid cotton seeds promoted as being bollworm-tolerant. "In order to establish that the tolerance to bollworm being claimed was from the use of Bt technology, Mahyco undertook a number of tests in its laboratories," Mahyco's Managing Director Dr. B.R. Barwale told Frontline. "These tests established that the seeds were transgenic seeds. Mahyco then communicated its findings to the GEAC in the MoEF and DBT, urging them to take strong and immediate action against this illegal and blatant contravention of the legal and regulatory processes, which govern the commercialisation of transgenic crops in India." Navbharat's actions, according to Barwale, have violated the Environmental Protection Act, 1986. "Any company seeking commercialisation of its hybrid variety has to conduct extensive nutritional and biosafety studies before the relevant regulatory authorities can even consider the case," he argued. It would appear, however, that the long-term interests of Mahyco and more particularly of its associate Monsanto, which has a highly controversial international reputation owing to its dominant ownership of a company that holds the patent for the 'Terminator' gene, may not be affected. Indeed, their commercial prospects in India can only be strengthened by the cowboy acts of small players such as Navbharat Seeds.

Monsanto's patient adherence to the regulatory procedures laid down by the Government of India will surely pay dividends. Monsanto is already seeking to introduce its 'Roundup-resistant' transgenic soyabean (a soya variety marketed by the company along with its 'Roundup' pesticide, which kills all non-soya plant material in the field) into the country. Media reports, quoting sources in the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), suggest that Monsanto has already been granted permission to import certain lines of its genetically engineered soyabean for testing under controlled laboratory conditions.

IT appears more or less certain that the Indian government will soon join the club of 14 countries which have opened their agriculture to genetically engineered crop varieties. The long-term human and environmental implications of that decision are fraught with uncertainties. But if that is the direction in which Indian agriculture will move, there could be more Navbharat-type actions which have the potential to cause immense damage. In a country where agriculture, which is the mainstay of a majority of the people, is backward and beset by problems such as drought and pest attacks, it is but natural that farmers will desperately seek agricultural inputs that promise better returns. A cotton farmer from Andhra Pradesh who is contemplating suicide because of the repeated crop failures he has suffered may not care too much about the long-term implications of transgenic seeds which have been inadequately evaluated. For him what matters is that the new seeds obviate the use of pesticides, that have anyway proved ineffective except when consumed orally by desperate farmers. The GEAC, which has been entrusted with the responsibility of approving transgenics, which appear to be here to stay, must move cautiously but fast. Navbharat-type actions will otherwise only proliferate, particularly since smuggling transgenic material into the country is relatively easy.