Genetically modified cotton in Africa will harm, not help, smallholder farmers

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It took just five seasons of genetically modified cotton cultivation in Burkina Faso for farmers to realise that they had been sold false promises. Farmers are now denouncing their contracts with Monsanto and cotton stakeholders are discussing compensation for losses incurred since 2008 due to low yields and low-quality fibre.

scottchan via freedigitalphotos.net

This news comes just as a number of African governments are on the brink of introducing GM cotton to their fields. While South Africa, Burkina Faso and Sudan have already commercialised GM cotton, Malawi, Ghana, Cameroon, Kenya, Swaziland, Uganda, Nigeria and Ethiopia could be next in line. Some Regional Economic Communities (RECs) are also poised to hasten the introduction of GM cotton in their regions by implementing investor-friendly biosafety policies that will apply to all their member states.

In this opinion piece, Haidee Swanby from the African Centre for Biodiversity (ACB) shows how GM cotton has impoverished smallholder farmers due to the expense of the technology coupled with inevitable technological failures associated with GM cotton crops. African producers are already deeply disadvantaged in the current global cotton sector.

African governments must think twice before burdening smallholders with bigger debts, onerous crop management techniques and the risk of crop failures in a trading environment where prices are declining and smallholders remain price-takers.

Read the full report here.