Farmers are awash in information, predictions, promotion and hype about the potential and diversity of the products of biotechnology, says Ontario farm leader Jeff Wilson.
“Yet the irony is that they are thirsty for knowledge,” said the chair of the National Agriculture Environment Committee.
Wilson and the NAEC are hoping to do something about it. By early next year, he expects a “farmer’s guide to biotechnology” will be available for producers across the country.
It will be aimed at arming average farmers with enough information that when a biotech company salesman shows up at the door promoting a product, he will be able to ask the proper questions.
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“I don’t want to knock anyone, but when a Monsanto sales rep is promoting their product, you are not getting a totally balanced perspective,” said Wilson. “We take seriously our role of getting information out.”
The NAEC was created by national commodity groups, provincial agriculture federations, the National Farmers Union and some organic representatives to consider the environmental implications of farming practices.
Wilson said the membership mix ensures the NAEC farmer’s guide will not be a promotion for biotech. “Some of our members are skeptical or opposed.”
Instead, it will attempt to explain the technology, its potential to produce chemical or pest resistant varieties, the promise of designer varieties offering particular qualities for use in new products and the environmental implications of some of these developments.
It also will offer tips on changes in management practices, which new biotech varieties might require.
And it will stress the need for farmers to be informed about the potential side effects, good and bad.
“In some cases, this is being promoted almost as a panacea, but it is not,” said Wilson, who farms a fruit and vegetable operation near Orangeville, Ont. “This is not for every one. There are different success rates for different products in different areas.”
He also noted that biotech varieties can cost more. “Farmers have to ask some tough questions about whether if they spend more to get the crop in, will they be pretty sure of making a buck at the other end.”
He said there is growing farmer concern about whether the new technology will give companies more power over producers and agriculture.
These days, there is talk of some varieties containing “terminator genes” which limit their effectiveness to one year. Each year, the farmer would have to buy new seed from the company.
“There is lots of talk about the terminator gene but not much information,” he said. “We need to know if it is in use, how it works, why it is there and in what products. I can see how this would create some sinisterism out there.”
