BT Cotton is a genetically modified organism or genetically modified pest-resistant variety of cotton. Genetically Modified (GM) pest resistant BT cotton hybrids have captured the Indian market since their introduction in 2002.

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Advantages by BT cotton:

• Several key studies by third-party economists and sociologists have established that
• 85% of hybrid Bt cotton seed farmers and farm laborers invested in better education for children; 77% reported better intake of nutritious food; 75% reported better health of their family members; 64% invested on the health of livestock;
• Female workers on Bt cotton fields earned an average 55% higher income; and 42.4 crore additional days of rural employment have been generated, thereby doubling cotton production.
• India’s farmers are the ones who have reposed trust in biotechnology, making India the world’s second largest cotton producer and exporter by doubling cotton production over the past decade
• Cotton Corporation of India data show that the highest production of 398 lakh bales of cotton in India was achieved in 2013-14, valued at around ?72,000 crore.
• Additional incomes were generated from cotton seeds oil (1.3 million tons) and cotton seed oil meal (11 million tons) worth ?13,000 crore and ?22,000 crore, respectively.
• Biotechnology in cotton, post its introduction in 2002, has led to transformational changes in India’s cotton cultivation. These have helped increase cotton yields by over 1.8 times — from 241 kg/hectare in 2002-2003 to 541 kg/hectare in 2018-2019.
• The significant increase in farmer incomes from higher yields and reduced pesticide use has generated additional farm income of over ?42,300 crore.
• India is moving to first place as the largest producer of cotton in the world.
• Due to the adoption of Bt cotton ensured that India transitioned into a cotton-exporting country from being a net importer.
• Hybrid cotton has delivered not only higher yields but also provided resistance to some pests and diseases.
• Less use of insecticides:-
• To produce the GM Cotton, the gene coding for Bt toxin (Cry-1-ac) has been inserted into cotton, causing cotton to produce this natural insecticide in its tissues. By this, the larvae are killed by the Bt protein in the GM cotton they eat. This eliminates the need to use large amounts of broad-spectrum insecticides to kill various pesticides.
• There is no doubt that the Bt technology has brought down the use of pesticides by about 50%.

Disadvantages of BT Cotton:

• Loss caused by the pink bollworm infestation have raised questions about the sustainability of GM cotton, which accounts for over 90% of all cotton grown in the country.
• GM crops face strident opposition due to their perceived adverse ecological, bio-safety measures and health implications.
• Cotton is also plagued by use of illegal herbicide-tolerant Bt cotton seeds.
• There was no substantial difference found between Bt and non-Bt cotton for germination and vigour, indicating that there is no substantial difference between transgenic Bt and control non-Bt cotton with regard to their weediness potential.
• Bt cotton hybrids do not have any toxic effects on the non -target species such as sucking pests. The beneficial insects remained active in both Bt and non Bt varieties.
• The growing number of farmers committing suicides in some cotton growing states has re-ignited the protests against the Bt Cotton.
• Normal cotton seed is largely unavailable to Indian farmers because of Monsanto’s control of the seed market.

Takeaways from the experience of BT cotton:

• First, we must be clear that the outcome of using a technology such as Bt is determined by the context in which it is deployed, and not just by the technology itself.
• If the context is suboptimal and does not prioritise the needs of the principal stakeholders (farmers), it can have significant negative fallouts, especially in India with a high proportion being marginal and subsistence farmers.
• Second, there is a need for better consultation in policy, be it agriculture as a whole or crop-wise.
• Notably, India is a signatory to international treaties on GMO regulation (the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety), which specifically provide for inclusion of socioeconomic considerations in GMO risk assessment.
• However, socioeconomic and need-based considerations have not been a part of GMO regulatory process in India.
• It is important to recognize that adoption of any new technology such as Bt is a choice and not an imperative.
• For example, some of the major cotton-producing countries such as Brazil (until 2012) and Turkey (up to the present) have achieved high productivity without the use of GM cotton by using alternative pest-management approaches.

Conclusion:

The purpose of risk assessment in GMO regulation is to enable exercising of this choice by careful and comprehensive evaluation of costs and benefits. In the case of Bt cotton hybrids, the benefits were limited and costs may well have been too high, particularly for resource-poor farmers.