Farmers use GM seeds to boost yield. |
Cotton output in India, the world's third-largest producer, may rise 7 per cent to a record in the year starting October as farmers increase the use of genetically altered seeds to boost yields. |
Production may rise to 29 million bales of 170 kg each as planting of modified cotton expands to over two-thirds of the nation's 9 million hectare growing area, O P Agarwal, executive director of the East India Cotton Association said. |
Record output in India may weigh on prices that rose to a one-year high in New York this week amid planting delays in the US, the biggest exporter, and improve sales for Monsanto Co, the world's biggest developer of genetically engineered crops. |
"What will help higher output is the rising yield from the use of genetically modified seeds," Agarwal said yesterday. "There are indications of production touching 28-29 million bales next year." |
Farmers in Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan planted modified cotton seeds, including Monsanto's Bollgard II variety, on at least 10 per cent more land, according to C S Teotia, marketing director at the state-run Cotton Corporation of India. |
Bollgard seed contains a protein from a soil microbe called Bacillus thuringiensis, or Bt, that protects the crop from bollworms and requires less pesticide |
India's average per-hectare yield has risen by two-thirds to 501 kg since it allowed cotton farmers to plant modified seeds for the first time in 2002. Output has almost doubled to 27 million bales, according to the country's Cotton Advisory Board. |
Indian mills have exported 4.7 million bales so far this year because of higher global prices, with more than 60 per cent going to China. India may this year surpass Uzbekistan as the world's second-biggest exporter of the fibre, East India's Agarwal said. |
"Better-quality Indian cotton due to use of Bt seeds has helped push exports," he said. "Chinese buyers are shifting partly to Indian cotton." |
Cotton futures for December delivery fell 0.8 per cent to $57.29 a pound on the New York Board of Trade yesterday. The contract rose to 57.74 cents a pound on June 11, the highest closing price for a most-active contract since June 12, 2006. |
Still, late rains can damage the Indian crop. "A lot will depend on the rains the cotton-growing states such as Gujarat and Maharashtra receive," said D K Nair, secretary general of the Confederation of Indian Textile Industry. "More than two-thirds of our cotton crop is still rain-fed." |
India's monsoon rains may cross into Maharashtra and Gujarat, the biggest cotton-growing states, later this week, the weather bureau said June 11. The four-month season, which provides four-fifths of the nation's total rainfall, will be 95 per cent of the long-term average, a level deemed normal, the bureau said April 19. |