Seeds of Discontent
Frederick R. Magdoff (fmagdoff@zoo.uvm.edu)
Thu, 20 Nov 1997 07:51:49 -0500 (EST)
Hi,
Thought people might be interested to know of an article in the
business section of yesterday's (Nov. 19) New York Times. It deals with
the problems farmers had with "Roundup Ready" and Bollgard (Bt) cotton in
the Mississippi Delta. One of the interesting (astounding?) aspects of the
story is that these varieties are being marketed to farmers with far LESS
testing than has been done for the varieties that have been produced in
the past through conventional breeding programs. So now there are a
significant numberof farmers who want to know who is going to compensate
them for the losses due to a) damage by roundup to supposedly RR cotton,
b) damage by boll weevils to Bt cotton, and other yield reducing problems
encountered with the new varieties.
FRED
*******************************************************************************
Fred Magdoff
Northeast Region SARE Program
Hills Building
University of Vermont
Burlington, VT 05405
tel:802-656-0472
fax:802-656-4656
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