After 8 years of growing genetically-modified (GM) cotton, Burkinabe farmers are abandoning the crop, although not all growers agree.
In 2003, Burkina Faso authorised trials on GM cotton, also called ‘Bt cotton’, and by 2008 the crop was being widely grown. Seeds developed by the US company Monsanto were supposed to resist bollworm attacks, which had been hampering cotton production for several years.
At Koumbia, one of the main cotton-growing areas in western Burkina Faso, Boyou Bognini – President of the Koumbia departmental union and Secretary General of the Tuy provincial cotton growers’ union – cultivates about 20 ha of cotton. “I have already ploughed 20 ha and I’m waiting for the rains,” he says. He slowly walks around his fields, stopping here and there to pluck a few cotton stalks that remain standing after ploughing. “I’ve been growing GM cotton for 8 years, and this was to be my ninth,” he says sullenly. Bognini states outright that he is not happy about the obligation to return to conventional cotton cultivation: “Conventional cotton is fraught with problems.” He feels that this decision represents a return to practices that have been given up for years. “There will undoubtedly be difficulties.”
This year the country is expecting to produce 700,000 t of cotton, compared to 581,000 t harvested in 2015-2016. “Will we be able to meet our expectations with the return to conventional cotton? I seriously wonder,” adds Bognini, who fears a drop in yields since, “most cotton growers no longer master the conventional cotton cropping techniques they abandoned years ago. I personally think that GM cotton was more advantageous. It’s not about the price – which has just fallen on the world market – but I had good yields with GM cotton. All you have to do is sow the crop, and once the weeding is done, the field doesn’t require any further maintenance.”
A few kilometres to the east, in the village of Kari-Lonkuy, cotton grower Lohan Wanhoun is heartened by the abandonment of GM cotton. “In 2012, I started growing GM cotton on a 7 ha plot where I had been growing conventional cotton. At the end of the season, I noticed that my seasonal credit had increased but my crop harvest had stagnated,” he says. He hesitates for a moment, to find the right words, and then adds, “With conventional cotton, my seasonal credit was never above €1,220. But with GM cotton, for the same harvest volume, my credit was over €1,524.”
Despite this first negative experience with GM cotton, Wanhoun tried planting it again the next season. “It didn’t work. My crop yields fell. GM cotton was supposed to be resistant to caterpillars, but my field was infested with them and control treatments proved unsuccessful. I gave up GM cotton in 2014 and returned to conventional cotton. Then, on the same field area, I was able to harvest 1 t more cotton than I did with GM crops. I concluded that GM cotton was not at all good for growers.”
Pierre Bangou is also not upset about the abandonment of GM cotton. He is a representative for organic cotton growers from Fada N’Gourma in eastern Burkina Faso. “I decided to start growing organic cotton in 2004 and I’m still at it. I opted for organic cotton because it seemed to be environmentally- and human-friendly.” According to Bangou, the introduction of GM cotton cropping has had an impact on organic cotton production. “Organic and GM cotton are two crops that don’t mix.
Measures taken to minimise contamination impose a distance of 50 to 100 m between organic cotton fields and GM cotton fields.” Organic cotton growers did their best, but contamination always occurred. “We don’t know how it happened, but the problem was always present,” he adds. These contaminations cause crop losses for organic farmers. “When contamination occurs in an organic cotton field, the crop is downgraded and sold as conventional cotton, which represents a net loss of income because conventional cotton is marketed at a 28% lower price,” explains Bangou.
In April 2016, the Inter-professional Cotton Association of Burkina (AICB), which pools the cotton growers’ union and three cotton companies, decided to suspend GM cotton production until further notice. One of the reasons was that, compared to the fibre produced by conventional cotton, GM cotton fibre is shorter, and less popular and profitable on the international cotton market.
AICB has called on Monsanto to compensate for this loss. The association wants Monsanto, or any other partner, to come up with a technical solution to this problem before it will consider a return to GM cotton.
Boyou Bognini is personally hoping for a quick return to Bt cotton. “If they tell me next year that the problem has been solved, I’m ready to go back to growing GM cotton and hope for the best,” he says. Meanwhile, Wanhoun is requesting compensation for the losses incurred. “The industry leaders have told us that they will come back to us once Monsanto has compensated the losses. We’re just waiting and keeping an eye on the situation,” he concludes.
