GM mustard to be Centre’s acid test for commercial use of GM crops

The Centre is looking to garner support from states in pushing genetically modified food crops to revive the agriculture sector using Genetically Modified mustard as a test case.

Updated on: Mar 15, 2016, 14:50:39 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Centre is looking to garner support from states in pushing genetically modified food crops to revive the agriculture sector using GM mustard as a test case.

Spurred by food security concerns, the Centre is pushing for support from state governments to use GM mustard seeds commercially. However, anti-GM activists argue introducing GM seeds to revive the agriculture sector will only give GM producing companies market monopoly instead of benefitting farmers. (Reuters File Photo)

Around half the Indian states have refused to give no-objection certificates for conducting field trials of genetically modified (GM) seeds – a must before getting final approval for commercial use. This has slowed down the development of bio-technology in agriculture to a large extent.

The move comes at the time when agriculture economy is in crises due to unseasonal rainfall in March-April for second year in a row and two drought years. The National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog believes GM crops, along with an increase in area of irrigation through the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sanchayi Yojana, will answer India’s agrarian crises.

The body was tasked by the Prime Minister’s Office to build consensus among states, and a report was expected by February end. However it failed to do so, and has been given more time to get state administrations on board.

“The last government always spoke about benefits of GM crops but didn’t do much to benefit from it. It (UPA) got bogged down by undue pressure of activists and was not able to convince the states about its benefits. We want the states to realise its gains,” said a senior NITI Aayog functionary.

The functionary added that getting states to support GM Mustard – being considered by Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee for final approval – will be a test for the future of GM crops in India. The committee is expected to take over a year to come out with its final conclusion.

“We want to convince the states that GM Mustard can improve productivity and reduce our dependence on import of oil seeds,” the official said.

NITI Aayog had in December 2015 come out with a paper supporting GM crop technology, in which it said the GM seeds have emerged as a “powerful new technology promising high productivity and lower use of fertilizers, weedicides and pesticides in the last one to two decades”. Claiming that they have gained increasing acceptance among farmers around the world, the paper said, “They (GM seeds) are likely to play increasingly important role in addressing many of the current problems in agriculture.”

However, states remain unconvinced.

Anti-GM activists added to predicament as they said the claimed benefits of GM mustard are highly exaggerated.

“By comparing results (of GM mustard) with very old checks or comparators, the crop developers are trying to show exaggerated benefits,” Sharad Pawar, a fellow of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS), said at a briefing organised by anti-GM crop campaigners in Delhi last week. “The tests do not conform to Indian Council for Agriculture Research (ICAR) protocols.”

NITI Aayog remains unfazed by the campaigners, who in a detailed presentation before the task force in 2015, stated that GM crops created a monopoly for companies promoting GM seeds instead of benefiting farmers.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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