Farmers' Voices

Mr Jerome Reddy and Mr Chinnapu Reddy, Fatimapur village, Kothur Mandal, Mahbubnagar dist. Jerome Reddy of Fatimapur village owns around 13 acres of land in the village, and is considered to be one of the progressive farmers of the village. Last season, he experimented with Bollgard, the Bt Cotton variety of Mahyco-Monsanto on 10 acres of his land. Looking back, he regrets the decision, and says that he does not feel good about growing Bt Cotton. His Bt Cotton crop yielded just 1 ½ quintals per acre! In all, he got 15 quintals out of his 10 acres. The exact amount that he was told that he would get, and that he had hoped to get, in one acre of his land with Bt cotton! With the economics working out very adversely, Jerome Reddy, like his brother, Thomas Reddy, is all set to experience a loss that runs into tens of thousands of rupees.

The investment per acre, as per his calculation is around Rs 10,000/- per acre, with the return being Rs 3000/- per acre (the 1 ½ quintals of yield sold at Rs 2000/- per quintal). The investment pattern was like this: on seed, for every acre: Rs 1600/-; on fertilizers (he applied 3 bags of fertilizers): around Rs 1500/-; on pesticides, for spraying Cypermethrin, Monocrotophos, Chlorpyriphos, Ekalux, Endosulfan, “Stop” etc.: Rs 5000/. He also used “tractor pumps” for spraying pesticides. Once the pests appeared, it was uncontrollable, he informed. In the earlier days, when he pest was spotted, he was advised by the company representatives not to resort to spraying. Believing them, he did not spray. But then, the pest attack became intense. Expensive pesticides like Tracer were also resorted to. In addition, he had to spend on agricultural operations like ploughing, sowing, weeding, plucking etc., in addition to spending on irrigation (he irrigated the crop twice during the season). The net loss per acre, according to him, is around Rs 7000/-. It has failed on the very counts on which promises were made, he said: on low pesticide expenses and on higher yields.

Mr Jerome Reddy and Mr Chinnapu Reddy have some very interesting experiences and stories to share about Bt Cotton. in 2001, they were all taken to a neighboring village, Reddypalem, where a large farmer called Rayapu Reddy had agreed to grow Bt Cotton of Mahyco-Monsanto on his land, as part of field trials. The crop on this 10-gunta plot was impressive – what was sown on this plot was Mech 12 variety however, and not Mech 162 that was later sold to the farmers; worse yet, the sowing season for the demonstrated variety was delayed by a whole month, knowingly and wrongfully by the Company. Rayapu Reddy was given the seeds only on July 22nd of 2001, while the normal sowing time is in the month of June. Incidentally, neighbors of Rayapu Reddy feel that the incidence of Heliothis was low on his crop during the field trial season because of the adjacent poultry farms with its lights on (these lights attract the insects away from the crops, according to them) the boll size of Bt Cotton was very small, and very less cotton in it.

The number of seeds per boll was also less – around 6-7, compared to a normal rate of 10-15. The number of bolls for Bt Cotton was only 20-30 bolls per plant, whereas other varieties in neighboring fields had nearly 100 bolls per plant. In their crop, the non-Bt refuge did not yield any bolls at all. Further, because of the small size of the boll, the plucking activity of cotton becomes more difficult and labour-intensive. The staple length of Bt is short and they had to plead with buyers to take it. While non-Bt varieties fetched around Rs 2500/- per quintal for other farmers, Bt Cotton fetched only Rs 2000/- per quintal. While the other varieties have more weight per volume, the Bt cotton is lighter and the farmer loses out on this count too, according to them. While non-Bt varieties yielded even without irrigation, the Bt Cotton crop of Thomas Reddy, though he irrigated it around 5-6 times in the last season, yielded dismally. The company representatives have stopped visiting them once the crop started showing its true characteristics. When confronted with the utter failure, the company representatives would only ask them to go to Warangal and meet the farmers there who have had good yields. Chinnapu Reddy also narrated the story of Ranga Reddy of neighboring Mallapuram village who incurred huge losses and threatened to kill himself with the very pesticides that he had used on the crop. He reported that Ranga Reddy had to sell two of his bullocks and three buffaloes after the Bt losses of last season. Like Jerome Reddy, Ranga Reddy also tried Bt Cotton on a large extent of land, believing in the promises made.

“The company guys and the dealers came to our doorstep to deliver the seeds. We should have known right then that something was wrong”, points out Chinnapu Reddy. One day, before the last cropping season, Chinnapu Reddy came back from the town, to find a large gathering and much activity. There were also reporters from the local papers present. When he went closer he discovered that this was about Bollgard, the “miracle Bt cotton” seed. In this “function”, the discussions on the seed were held for one and half hours and more time was spent on a big feast. As Chinnapu Reddy recalls, there was 95 kilos of non-vegetarian food cooked that day and there was biryani and chicken fry. On that very day, “bookings” for the season’s seed supply were made by the dealers and the company representatives. “They had thrown parties and people like us thought there must be something in here. And we agreed to buy the seeds. Now, it has brought the farmers nearer to the gates of suicide deaths again”, he remarks.

Mr Akki Ramulu of Mallapuram, Kothur Mandal, Mahbubnagar Dist. Ramulu had grown Bt Cotton in one acre of land, expecting around 18 quintals of yield per acre as per the promises made to him. He did not get even two quintals of yield!
He, along with other farmers (this village saw around 23-25 acres of Bt cotton sown in the last season, with just one farmer, Ranga Reddy growing on 12 acres of land) were told that no pesticides would be required, he reported. “Pests could not be controlled even with pesticides, leave alone the fact that they will not appear”, he remarks. “It has been a complete loss”.
It is true that bollworm did not appear for the first three months, he reports, but when it did appear, there was no controlling it. He used Monocrotophos, Ekalux, Pride a couple of times and so on. Sprayed around five times in all and after realizing that the pest cannot be controlled, stopped. He counts himself as the one who got the worst experience from Bt Cotton – slightly more than one quintal from his one acre. While he calculates his expenses to be around Rs 12000/- (seed: 1600/; Farm Yard Manure of one tractorload: 3000/; 3 bags of fertilizers – one urea and 2 DAP bags: 2000/; pesticides: 2000/; other expenses of ploughing, labor, sowing etc.: 3500/), the return was Rs 2000/- only. He laughs deprecatingly, asked about the return. The net loss is around 10,000/- rupees. Asked about what he plans to do now, he joins the other farmers around him in saying that they are waiting for the company representatives to turn up in the area again so that they can bash them up and burn their jeeps! He says that this company’s objective is to make farmers lose, with varieties and technologies like this. The despair of the farmers is obvious, with nowhere to turn to. One of them says, “what can we do? Even earlier, when companies cheated the farmers and we got a top executive of XXX company arrested, did he not come out soon after? What can we do if the government is not interested in protecting us”?

Ramulu also shared other interesting information:
- the company representatives used to visit him quite often in the beginning. Then they stopped coming, once the problems started manifesting themselves on the crop. When confronted about the losses, they even promised to give compensation, only to escape and not to be seen again. Another time, they were told that the company would “adjust” the losses against the seed price in the next season and promised to give the Bt cotton seed at a lower price to them the next season.
Farmers immediately folded their hands and said that they did not want to touch the seeds ever again!
- Buyers refused to buy the variety separately until mixed with other varieties and sold. The boll size was smaller and the staple length was also shorter
- One of the neighboring farmers said that it was because of the extravagant feasts that the company threw for the farmers that the farmers believed them and lined up for buying the seeds. Now, they know better.

Tirumal Reddy Rayapu Reddy and his brother, Melkior Reddy, Reddypalem,Kothur Mandal, Mahbubnagar District, Andhra Pradesh It was Rayapu Reddy’s Bt Cotton field trial plot of 10 guntas (1/4th of an acre) in 2001 that had drawn many other farmers to the fatal temptation of Bollgard. What they saw that year on the field trial plot was the Mech 12 variety, that too sown in the last week of July. In this country, one of the main objections to the field trials of Bt Cotton prior to 2001, is the unscientificity especially in terms of the sowing time. That is the reason why the GEAC had asked for one more year of trials. The company, of course, resorted to wrongful procedures in 2001 too to get the approval for commercialization.
Rayapu Reddy owns 25 acres of land in the village, and between him and his brother Melkior Reddy, they had sown Bt cotton in 8 acres of land – 4 acres each. The yield has not been more than 3 quintals per acre. Worse yet, when they tried to sell their Bt cotton, the price that was quoted was Rs 1300/- only, while other varieties were fetching farmers upto Rs 2400/- per quintal. After they mixed Bt cotton variety with other varieties, buyers were willing to pay upto Rs 1800/-. They point out that even the labourers in the village were not too keen to work in the Bt fields since the plucking activity from the small bolls is too tedious. The costs on labour for Bt cotton were double than the normal costs on other varieties.
The brothers had also sown other cotton varieties in around five acres of land, and the yield was around ten quintals on an average per acre, last season. And these varieties fetched even uptil Rs 2600/- per quintal for a couple of days in the market.
They found bollworm incidence to be excessively high on Bt Cotton after the first 60-70 days. They had to resort to using pesticides like endosulfan, monocrotophos, cypermethrin and “Tracer”. In fact, a highly expensive pesticide like Tracer was used twice to control the pest incidence. They also found that the flowers and bolls would form but soon dry up and fall. Melkior Reddy also opines that the Bt plant itself is not as strong as non-Bt varieties.
The brothers reported about the fact that Monsanto-Mahyco had given them the seeds for the field trial only in the month of July (could sow on July 22nd) in 2001. They feel that with late sowing and the onset of winter, the incidence of bollworm would expectably, be lesser and that is what the company had shown. But in real growing conditions of farmers, they cannot
afford to sow late because the incidence of other pests and diseases would be unbearably higher in such a case.
Rayapu Reddy and Melkior Reddy are thoroughly disappointed with the company. While the expenditure was around Rs 12000/- per acre, including the irrigation that they provided to the crop, the yield was just 3 quintals per acre, amounting to returns of around Rs 5400/-. Therefore, there was a net loss of Rs 6600/- per acre, and a total loss of Rs 52,800/- approximately in all the 8 acres. They point out that the company representatives had stopped coming. When they were confronted by an angry mob of farmers during their last visit, they had promised to give seeds for next season at a lower price. They said, “we can’t pay you money since there will be many other who will be asking us for compensation. Therefore, the company can’t pay you money, but we will try and ‘adjust’ against next season’s seed supply”. The farmers ofcourse refused to get more Bt seeds. It was only the presence of senior political leaders during the last visit that prevented the company representatives from being bashed up by the farmers, they reported. We have now experienced that the promises of the company are not true, the brothers say.

Deccan Chronicle, March 4, 2003Some of the farmers who sowed the much-debated genetically engineered Bt cotton variety are now cursing their decision.
A cotton farmer T Ramanaiah of Kapulakanaparthy village told that he invested about Rs 30,000 to grow the Bt cotton variety in his three-acre plot. "I was aghast to get only two quintals of yield per acre, instead of the promised seven to eight quintals per acre", rues Ramanaiah who was carried away by the publicity hype.

Another farmer, P Prabhakar Rao of Chinta Nekkonda village, said he had grown the Bt Cotton in his one acre plot. The yield was between four and five quintals per acre. Surprisingly, this was low yield when compared to the non-Bt cotton varieties' yield of seven to eight quintals per acre, he said. "My experience of growing Bt cotton proved that it requires more costs on labour as it demands more attention at the time of harvesting and it was wrong to believe that it doesn't require pesticides", says a farmer I Rajamouli of Parakala Nagaram village.