Due to the twenty-first century’s exponentially growing population size, the rate of food consumption is dramatically increasing. In July 2000, the Indian Academy of Sciences, the Mexican Academy of Sciences, the U.S. National Academy of Science, the Royal Society of London, and the Third World Academy of Sciences presented a “Transgenic Plants and World Agriculture” report. This joint report stressed the importance of GM technology in modern society due to its ever-increasing population size and food consumption (Easton 230). GM technology has so far provided a stable means for nutritious, health promoting, and rapid food production. Genetically engineered crops will become increasingly more important due to withstanding harsh conditions caused by climate change and supplying the growing global population that is said to be 9 billion by 2050. Despite integrous institutions such as the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine assuring that genetically modified foods lack significantly impactful environmental and health detriments, many people remain concerned for GM technology’s potential issues concerning safety, toxicity, ecology, allergies, and nutrition (Easton 230). Anti-GMO activists like Vandana Shiva claim that due to genetically engineered crops like Monsanto’s Bt seeds failing to increase productivity and incomes, many farmers have been driven to commit suicide. Although it is irrefutable that Indian farmers are committing suicide, the true culprit of this “genocide” is in fact India’s unsupportive banking system. Due to India’s banking system, private lenders and their inflated rates extort money from farmers who borrow money to buy crop seeds. Alongside interpersonal, familial, and mental issues, farmers who now face immense debt caused by borrowing from private lenders are compelled to commit suicide.
In the 1990s, India’s banking system underwent multiple reforms which, consequently, allowed the practice of foreign and private banks. According to the Journal of Developing Areas, with this new generation of bankers, India’s banking sector became highly competitive. Banks began viewing loans being made to agricultural and rural workers as unreliable and unprofitable (Kloor 237). The World Bank states that while India does have a broad financial network, those of the rural poor are excluded due to “inefficiencies in the formal financial institutions, the weak regulatory framework, high transaction costs, and risks associating with lending to agriculture" (Kloor 237). From Syracuse University, the political economist, Anoop Sadanandan, found that states which experienced the highest farmer suicide rates were those with the least offered institutional credit for agricultural workers (Kloor 237). Due to a lack of support from banks, farmers relied on private lenders to borrow money for their crop seeds, fertilizers, and other agricultural items. These private lenders exhorted the farmers’ money via charged interest rates that inflated as high as 45%. In states that supplied accessible farm insurance and institutional credit, the rate of farmer suicides was significantly lower.
The states with lower farmer suicide rates not only had better accessible farmer insurance and institutional credit, but also had better land irrigation. India’s agricultural sector detrimentally lacks proper mechanization and irrigation systems. Because of these two shortcomings, Indian farmers heavily rely on their erratic rain seasons. With random weather influxes and climate change, farmers are frequently left vulnerable when the monsoonal seasons fail to deliver or destroy their crops. On November 22, 2013, the Hindustan Times reported that seven farmers committed suicide due to “unseasonably heavy rains” destroying their crops (Kloor 241). Sadanandan states that Indian banks only offer credit to farmers who own irrigated land due to being better viable, and therefore, more profitable (Kloor 238). With the widespread lack of proper irrigation and technology, many rural workers are left unsupported and forced to rely on the erratic monsoonal weather. Caused by the lack of proper irrigation and ruined crops, farmers partake in a vicious cycle of increased debt by further borrowing from private loan institutions to purchase more crop seeds and material.
These vulnerable farmers not only experience a lack of institutional credit and irrigation, but also other social problems such as familial and interpersonal issues. The Lancet conducted a survey in 2012 which found that India’s suicide mortality was primarily caused by “most common contributors…a combination of social problems, such as interpersonal and family problems and financial difficulties, and pre-existing mental illness" (Kloor 237). Sadanadan also stated farmers who experience the “debt burden” are driven to suicide due to cultural shame (Kloor 238). In 2012, the Indian government gave a report that stated the main causes of rural farmers’ deaths was “indebtedness and lenders confiscating land” (Kloor 241). So rather than being driven by a single GM crop, farmers commit suicide due to the lack of support by India’s banking system and a combination of social and cultural factors.
Anti-GMO activists like Vandana Shiva have publicized the GMO-suicide myth with controversial, eye-catching titles like “Every 30 minutes an Indian farmer commits suicide as a result of Monsanto’s GM crops” (Kloor 238). Shiva, an Indian environmentalist, protests against a world which utilizes genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Shiva believes the biotechnology industry harms our biodiversity, health, and freedom of choice. Anti-GMO protesters claim Monsanto’s “suicide seeds” are the cause of the “genocide” in rural India (Thomas and Tavernier). Partnering with Indian seed companies, Monsanto created genetically engineered Bt protein cotton seeds designed to help crops ward off insects like bollworms. Shiva claims these seeds have failed, and therefore, have decreased both cotton yields and incomes (Shiva, “Seed Monopolies” 232).
Additionally, Shiva and anti-GMO proponents oppose the globalized, free trade of neoliberalism that only benefits large companies like Monsanto (Kloor 240). Shiva presents Monsanto as the Indian farmer’s enemy due to supposedly abusing its political and patented power to control the seed trade (Shiva, “Seed Monopolies” 232). By controlling the seed trade, Monsanto is presumably able to eliminate other traditional crop resources while spiking up the prices on their Bt seeds. Shiva and other anti-GMO activists believe that crop seeds should be made available to all as a commons’ resource (Easton 231). Shiva states that by patenting these seeds, these corporations are attempting to essentially patent life (Shiva, “Seeds of Truth”). To protect both cultural and biological diversity alongside improving sustainability efforts, Shiva urges our governments to remove hindering corporate restrictions on commons’ resources (Easton 231). However, Shiva’s direct causational relationship between Bt seeds and farmer suicides is naïve.
Cornell University’s political scientist, Ronald Herring, has identified multiple contradictions in Shiva’s argument. Herring has presented data disputing Shiva’s claim that Bt seeds have supposedly failed to produce results and worsened rural conditions. Supported by multiple studies, Bt seeds have significantly reduced cotton farmers’ pesticide spraying and wasteful spending. Due to Bt seeds’ GM designed utility, farmers can save more money by spending less on pesticides and earn more from larger yields. PLOS ONE’s 2013 study found that India’s great adoption of GM cotton has “significantly improved calories consumption and dietary quality, resulting from increased family incomes” (Kloor 240). This finding is additionally backed by similar results in China where 80% of its crops are Bt cotton. A 2008 meta-review that analyzed data from 2002 to 2006 found Bt cotton to be “quite successful in most states and years in India” and has contributed “to an impressive leap in average cotton yields, as well as decrease in pesticide use and increase in farmer revenue” (Kloor 237). In 2012, the Indian agricultural minister, Sharad Pawar, admitted that since Bt seeds were introduced, India’s cotton yield has boomed from initially 3 million tons to 5.1 million tons per year (Kloor 237). Due to the greater ability and utility of Bt seeds, India has become the world’s second largest producer of cotton following China. The continuation of capitalist firms’ immense investments in expensive production licensing for GM technology further supports genetically engineered crops’ success.
Herring provides an explanation to Shiva’s claim that Bt seeds have supposedly failed to perform as Montecito has promised (Kloor 239). Between early to mid-2000s, Bt seeds were in such a high demand that unscrupulous groups began selling counterfeit GM cotton seeds to Indian farmers. Farmers swarmed to buy these counterfeits due to being cheaper. Although they were cheaper, these deceitful seeds that were being sold did not have the pest-resistant Bt protein. Because these counterfeits did not contain the GM Bt gene, some farmers were continuously forced to wastefully spending on pesticides, desperately hoping to produce higher crop yields. Herring states that these farmers were led to “honestly but mistakenly believe that their Bt crop failed” (Kloor 239).
The production of fake Bt seeds is one of the many examples that India has overwhelmingly adopted Bt seeds due to their widespread success. Since 2002, when Bt seeds were officially approved, these genetically modified crops have been in high demand. There has been a witnessed sharp adoption influx by large and small farmers with around 90% of Indian cotton implementing the Bt seed. Farmers have overwhelming embraced the GM seed not only by buying them, but also by saving, replanting, and crossing them into new hybrids (Specter). Herring comments, “It is hard to imagine farmers spreading a technology that is literally killing them” (Kloor 237). Shiva and fellow anti-GMO activists have failed to produce evidence that has indicated Bt-using farmers are more inclined to commit suicide than non-using agricultural workers. Instead, farmers who use Bt cotton seeds have holistically benefitted from these GM crops’ health promoting and agriculturally advanced qualities. With such a large adoption by farmers and proven results of Bt seeds’ effectiveness, Shiva and other anti-GMO activists’ posed agro-economic questions and doubts have been sufficiently settled.
It is clear that India crucially requires effective policy reforms that will sufficiently financially and socially support rural farmers. Alongside with a faulty banking system, due to a combination of factors like erratic weather and unfortunate social circumstances, vulnerable farmers are tragically driven to commit suicide. Vandana Shiva herself admits that GM crops are a component within a complex system of multiple interacting pieces (Specter). Therefore, by falsely accusing a single crop for the cause of mass farmer suicide via sensationalist stories, Shiva and other anti-GMO activist are unfairly distracting the public from the real culprits of this tragedy. By doing so, Shiva and anti-GMO proponents are doing more harm than good for Indian farmers. As presented in Ronald Herring’s account, Shiva’s seductive narration which demonizes biotechnology is filled with contradictions. The Indian Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare and other integrous institutions have confirmed the results and consequences
of Bt seed usage with concrete evidence. Farmers who implement Bt cotton seeds experience less pesticide spending, larger yields, higher incomes, and therefore, improved livelihoods and wellbeing. If Shiva and other anti-GMO activists are to continue arguing against GM technology, then they must propose new claims that are supported by thorough research.