Print This PageLearn About Biotechnology
Over the last 30 years, the application of agricultural biotechnology has enabled scientists to develop a new generation of beneficial agricultural crops, delivered simply in the seed, for farmers throughout the world. From the initial commercial product launch, agricultural biotechnology has been adopted faster than any other farming improvement since introduction of the tractor in the 1800's.
Agricultural biotechnology is just one set of scientific tools that Monsanto uses to help innovate the development of desirable traits in food, feed and fiber agricultural crops that increase value for farmers, processors and consumers. In the spirit of the selective breeding practices used by farmers for centuries, and consistent with the experimental findings of Gregor Mendel in the 19th century, agricultural biotechnology promotes improvement in plants by working with the basic DNA building blocks. The modification of plant genes through these modern techniques enables plant breeders to make improvements more rapidly and with greater precision than was previously possible through cross-breeding, grafting and other approaches.
Monsanto scientists successfully produced the first genetically modified plants - petunias - in 1983. After a dozen years of additional research and development, involving thousands of experiments, first in the laboratory and then in field trials, involving many varieties of plants, and countless process improvements, the first commercial biotech products received regulatory clearance in North America in 1995, opening the way for commercial introduction in 1996. These earliest commercial traits were:
- Glyphosate-tolerant canola and soybeans, which enabled the plants to have built-in protection against glyphosate-based herbicides, including Roundup. This built-in protection provided growing canola and soybean plants an advantage in the field over weeds, allowing farmers to neutralize nutrient-robbing weeds while the young soybean plants developed; and
- Cotton with built-in insect tolerance, which induced the plant to produce its own in-plant protection, Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt). Bt is the same bacteria-based insecticides applied by farmers, including organic farmers, over the tops of their crops for many years;
The 2005 crop season marked a decade of commercial planting of ag biotech crops throughout the world. Following the initial product launches, additional crops were made available, and traits were produced in more varieties of crops, making them better suited for various growing conditions around the world. These new crops were eagerly adopted by millions of farmers such that it is calculated that this tenth year witnessed the planting and harvesting of the billionth cumulative acre of biotech crops. This has led observers to assert that agricultural biotechnology has been adopted faster than any other farming improvement since introduction of the tractor in the 1800's.
Agricultural biotechnology is a well regulated industry. Typically, new agricultural biotech products go through a series of safety assessments that conventional crops do not. Throughout the world, established regulatory agencies review research data and the results of field trials before clearing new products for commercialization. In Canada, for example, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA); Health Canada; and the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) are the three agencies that routinely have responsibility for this review. Other countries have corresponding regulatory bodies.
Many peer-reviewed scientific studies have been completed, both by universities and government agencies in the public sector, as well as by industry - including Monsanto researchers. These studies demonstrate the efficacy of the traits made available through biotechnology, their safety for human and animal consumption, and the benefits they deliver. Recent reports include the annual global report of the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA) and research completed by the Canola Council of Canada and PG Economics in the U.K. These reports have found that the benefits from biotech crops are scale-neutral; that is, farmers reap the benefits from the new biotech crop regardless of the amount of acreage cultivated. Further the reports document that the benefits to farmers include increased crop yields, the ability to reduce on-farm chemical use, the opportunity to transition to more environmentally-friendly farming practices, such as reduced tillage, and savings in both time and money.
Additional Resources
A first-hand look at the ways biotechnology has positively changed farmers' lives, presented from the farmers' perspectives, is available at our Web site, "Conversations about Plant Biotechnology" (hyperlink). Farmers from around the world have recorded their experiences and share those as a way to explain their continued planting of biotech crops, season after season.
For visitors interested in learning more about the subject of agricultural biotechnology, we've compiled a list of general information and/or education-oriented web sites for your convenience:
Canadian websites:
www.whybiotech.ca
www.canola-council.org
www.foodsafetynetwork.ca
www.agcare.org
www.agwest.sk.ca
www.biotech.ca
http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/toc/bioteche.shtml
Others:
www.biotechknowledge.com
www.isaaa.org
www.biotech-gmo.com
www.pewagbiotech.org
www.agbioforum.org
www.biotechinstitute.org
For more valuable information sources, click here.
