This was my Saturday’s lyrics to breakfast in sunny Bangalore: Monsanto has decided to tell the truth about something: its technology doesn’t work!, reports The Hindu.
I’m going to need a second cup of chai to digest this, Monsanto speaking honest!?
Indian farmers and scientist have been seeing this in their Bt cotton fields for a few years: pests become resistant to Monsanto’s genetically engineered toxins and thus farmers apply huge amounts of pesticides.
Monsanto has always denied this, has the recent massive rejection of its Bt brinjal in India woken up its senses?
For years Monsanto has been shouting that the main – read only – benefit of Bt cotton in India (the only genetically engineered crop planted here) was the reduction in pesticide use.
Well, it seems they have just admitted this is not true.
Pink bollworm, a serious pest for cotton farmers in India, is now resistant to the toxin in Bt cotton.
Meaning that this bug is now sort of a super-pest that farmers will have to work harder and harder to avoid.