GMO

Most of us think minimally about our food, where it comes from, the seed. With a rapidly growing world population the genetic diversity of the seed from which we grow food becomes increasingly crucial.

The United States contains 20 gene banks: three in California, one in each of the following states, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Colorado, Hawaii, Texas, Iowa, Arkansas, Illinois, Wisconsin, Georgia, Ohio, New York, Maryland, Florida, and Puerto Rico and Washington D.C. This system holds about 600,000 varieties. The seed bank in Ames, Iowa, contains 53,000 genetic lines of maize (corn) and other crop seeds–1400 species. The Illinois bank grows more than 2000 varieties of seeds per year.

Maintaining genetic integrity can be difficult. Some crops like corn are particularly difficult because corn easily cross pollinates. Researchers use these seeds to develop certain types of new varieties, e.g. varieties more resistant to disease, to drought.

Gene banks remain crucial to the future of agriculture and food even with the current controversies over GMO. Some farmers note that any hybrid whether deliberate or by accident is genetically modified. These modifications have existed since the beginning of agriculture.

A possibly more dire issue is the lack of wild relatives of key crops. Global gene banks lack many of these. The online journal, “Nature Plants” notes 1076 wild relatives of 81 crops were insufficiently safe-guarded. Up to 300 species could not be located in any gene bank. The lack of tropical crops in gene banks is particularly worrisome. This is important for the future of agriculture and the world food supply. Seed banks create safety nets for the future.

Perhaps the most remote and “safe” bank lies in Norway 800 miles from the North Pole. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault can store seed for 25 years without power. This vault stores seeds at -18 C and contains 825,000 crop varieties.

Note: the photo is corn close to the Nile Falls near Bahir Dahr, Ethiopia

SOYBEAN CHECKOFF

If you grow soybeans, there is this program–not sure what else to call it–named the Soybean Checkoff. Basically, when you sell soybeans, you get docked a few cents per amount sold to advertise, etc. soybeans. I received my latest issue of the Lonestar Soybeans recently. For those of you reading from afar, Lonestar refers to Texas. It is the Lonestar state and our flag has one lone star on it. Back to soybeans. First, there is a report on soybean production issues. Research is to the point in terms of soybean physiology that they are about to zero in on optimal planting time, conditions, latitude, etc. Here in this part of Texas, generally no one grows soybeans. We grow irrigated corn and wheat, milo, sorghum, and crops that do not require as much water as soybeans.

EXPORTS AND ETHANOL

I grew up on a farm where we raised both soybeans and corn–I still do. We raised some wheat also; tried milo, but it was too wet in Missouri. Never thought a lot about where my soybeans went after I sold them so I learned something new today. Compared to all other crops, we export more soybeans than anything else–to the tune of 20 billion dollars a year. We also export a lot of wheat–about the same as soybeans, but soybeans trump wheat if you include soybean meal and oil. Meanwhile corn exports have dropped steadily since 2007 or so. Why? Ethanol.

GMO

This report does not tell the reader some other notable facts. While almost all corn grown commercially in the United States is GMO, such is not the case for soybeans. The big market for soybeans is Asia and at least China will pay more for non-GMO soybeans. 60 per cent of all soybean exports go to China. For those of you out there who are adamant about GMO, perhaps the solution is demand for non-GMO. Currently, the only way I know to get non-GMO corn is to find a company that sells heirloom seeds and plant and harvest the corn yourself or find a small farmer who does this.