The world is no more ready for Syngenta’s fusarium resistant wheat than it was for Monsanto’s herbicide tolerant offering, says a new report.
“Through mid-2006 we have not seen evidence, either from World Trade Organization policy decisions or other developments, that consumers in major foreign markets are changing their view toward GM wheat,” said Iowa State University economics professor Robert Wisner.
Wisner made the comments in a September 2006 update to a 2003 study about the potential impact of commercializing Monsanto’s Roundup Ready wheat. In May 2004, Monsanto shelved its plans to commercialize the world’s first GM wheat crop.
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The report was prepared for the Western Organization of Resource Councils, a regional network of farmers and ranchers opposed to the introduction of GM crops.
The group points to the recent GM rice contamination incident as proof that consumers are not ready for GM wheat. In September, traces of Bayer’s Liberty Link rice were detected in commercial supplies, causing Japan to suspend imports of U.S. rice and the European Union to impose mandatory testing of the product.
“This demonstrates the resolve of Japan and the EU to keep food grains like rice and wheat GM free. This is a warning to U.S. wheat producers – this easily could have been wheat,” said Western Organization of Resource Councils spokesperson Todd Leake.
Wisner’s study said the introduction of GM wheat would create a “high risk of loss” of one-third to one-half of U.S. hard red spring wheat exports and an even larger percentage of durum exports, due mainly to the total loss of the EU market.
Daren Coppock, chief executive officer of the U.S. National Association of Wheat Growers, said the findings of Wisner’s report are suspect considering the study was sponsored by an anti-biotechnology group.
That said, he finds nothing controversial about the main contention of the report.
“We understand the market is not ready. Our answer is let’s get to work and prepare the way,” said Coppock.
The U.S. wheat industry is attempting to change the conventional mindset by telling customers that if they maintain an objection to GM wheat they will continue to struggle with poor quality fusarium-infected product.
Worse yet, the industry will continue losing acreage to genetically modified corn and soybean crops.
“If we’re not able to introduce this technology it’s going to be harder and harder for you to find the wheat that you need because we’re just not going to be growing it,” Coppock is telling buyers of U.S. wheat.
That argument doesn’t hold much water with Wisner, who said wheat acreage has been falling for a myriad of reasons.
“At this stage there is no way of knowing for certain whether genetically modified varieties of wheat would halt or reverse the decline in U.S. wheat acres,” he said.
Wisner said the industry doesn’t need to put all its faith in GM wheat because a few non-GM varieties of fusarium-resistant wheat have been developed for commercial production.
Coppock said there have been small advancements in traditional breeding programs and pesticides. But if you took the best genetics available and applied the best fungicides on the market, it would still fall way short of what Syngenta’s GM wheat offers.
“If we continue to ignore this technology we do so at our own peril.”
