Tape #213 - The Green Revolution

 

Alice Dettwyler:

 

It's time for us to get started.  I'm going to start out by introducing myself and we're going to be doing this in a three part, three parts.  I'm going to be talking about the past and Jean Pettibone will talk about the present and Melanie will talk about the future.

 

I am a farmer.  My husband and I raise strawberries and grass seed and some speciality seeds.  In fact this year we're raising some burdock, which is a weed to a lot of you.  But the Oriental market likes the burdock for the root so we grow the seed for it. 

 

I'm from Salem, Oregon.  I am the first vice president of American AgriWomen and so I am actively involved in that organization.  I'm also a charter member of Oregon Women For Ag, which was organized in 1969. 

 

Oregon Women for Ag was the first women’s organization in the nation that was independent of a man's group.  We are not affiliated with a commodity or another group like Farm Bureau.  A lot of us are Farm Bureau members.  I am myself, but we are an independent organization. 

 

I started working in the strawberry fields of Oregon when I was six years old.  I went out with my mother and my grandmother.  It was pretty much a necessity.  I was the third of seven children and if I wanted school clothes I needed to work.  It was a very valuable part of my education because I learned at a very early age the value of hard work and the benefits of hard work.  So I never have regretted it. 

 

In 1947, after two World Wars and the Great Depression, major nations of the world signed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which lowered trade barriers.  At that time a surge of economic growth resulted from the signing of this agreement.  Suddenly there were Asian products in U.S. stores, there were Polish products, there were products from all other countries.  Suddenly there were U.S. airliners in other countries and there was U.S. medical technology in other countries.

 

After the Second World War, the global population also begin to take off.  It became apparent that the only way that agriculture was going to keep up with providing sufficient food was to increase the intensity of production. 

 

Dr. Norman Borlaug was the agronomist whose discovery sparked what we know as the Green Revolution.  Dr. Borlaug's accomplishments have been labeled the Green Revolution because suddenly developing countries started to experience yield increases.  It was felt that between the Western technical experts and peasant farmers, there might be a shakeup of existing culture and class system.  And I think that was the reason a lot of people referred to that time as a revolution.

 

In 1944 Dr. Borlaug began working with the Rockefeller Foundation at the Foundation's International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center in Mexico.  In 1970, Dr. Borlaug received the Nobel Peace Prize, mainly for his work in reversing the food shortages that haunted India and Pakistan in the 1960s.  Borlaug helped to develop the high yield, the high protein dwarf wheat upon which a substantial portion of the world's population now depends on.

 

Many people feel that producing more food will only aggregate the world population.  But the trend down in population began in 1970, which was the wake of the Green Revolution. 

 

The keys to the Green Revolution were plant breeding, improved fertilizer, improved irrigation methods and pesticides.  High yield agriculture has made it possible for less than two percent of the population in the United States to feed the remaining ninety-eight percent.

 

Now for the next part of the program we'll have Jean Pettibone.  She is the past president of American Agri-Women and a Kansas farmer.  Jean.

 

Jean Pettibone:

 

Thank you Alice.  O.K., what I'm going to talk about is present day high yield farming in this country.

 

I'm the immediate past president of American Agri-Women, a national coalition of farm, ranch and agribusiness women.  We have fifty-four affiliates across the nation.  We cut across all commodities.  We have people from timber.  We have fruit and vegetable growers, wheat, just practically every commodity this country grows including beef, sheep, poultry.  So over the past few years, I've gained a lot of knowledge about what's happening in this country's agriculture.  Plus I am a full-time partner on a farm.  I want to tell you about the region where we live and where we do farm.

 

I live in what's called the high plains region of Kansas and Eastern Colorado.  We are semi- arid.  I'm giving you some of this background so you know what type of area I come from and so you can understand the type of methods that we have developed to farm in this region.

 

We are semi-arid, meaning that we average approximately seventeen inches of rainfall a year, natural rain fall.

 

But when I talk about we are semi-arid, we're windy.  Every acre we own is prime, flat farm ground, but it’s subject to wind erosion. Our elevation is four thousand feet.

 

The crops that we produce in our area are wheat, an awful lot of wheat.  I think I should point out its the largest acreage that's grown.  It's not the biggest money maker where I live, but it is the most acres.  We also grow corn and edible beets, pinto beans.  That's probably the smallest acreage we have, but that's also what carries the rest of the farm. 

 

We have in the past grown popcorn, we have grown a variety of other beans.  We've also grown sunflowers, three different varieties, the confection kind you eat, the oil kind and then the bird seed type.

 

I think it's important to tell you what we have managed to develop in a very very rural area.  Now because or our climate, if you have been there a hundred years, you've learned some tough lessons.  We have developed over the years methods to conserve our top soil and moisture. 

 

We use the principles of high yield agriculture.  We are providing more, we are growing more food on the same acres and we're doing it through the use of commercial fertilizers, pesticides and improved seed varieties.  We irrigate.  Now, irrigation comes from the underground aquifers.  We are now using sender pivot systems with low density nozzles.  We can irrigate more acres, there's no run off, no loss and we're doing it with less water.

 

Another thing that's helped us to develop and keep going is the improved seed varieties.  New corn, wheat, and bean seeds have been developed that are disease resistant.  We also have new seeds that fight insects, eliminating the need for spray.  We have new varieties that allow you to use weed control products and chemicals right over the top of the crop.  This eliminates a need for more cultivation, more working the ground.  You're conserving moisture.

 

We have been doing a modified integrated pest management program for a long long time on our farm.  To us it made a lot of sense to hire somebody to help us.  We've had a crop consultant on our farm for about fifteen years.  He makes regularly weekly visits to our crops and fields, walks the fields, makes recommendations on what should be used.  He also recommends fertilizers, pesticides and seeds and checks for diseases.

 

We rely heavily on this.  This man has to justify the cost.  So he has done a good job for us or we wouldn't keep paying him for all these years.  It's given us the opportunity to base decisions on something more than a “drive-by” of the fields.

 

Another thing we have done, because of our weather patterns, is engage in crop rotation.  It takes a lot of acres out where we live because of the summer fallow practice.  We allow it to lie fallow, which keeps the weeds down, depending on the year and the climate.  Then we’ve done the rotation. 

 

Our pinto beans follow corn ground.  The corn puts humus back into the soil.  There is usually left over fertilizer.  We add some micronutrients and it’s ready to plant.  Sometimes it takes a while for the soil temperature in the spring to get up high enough to sprout corn seeds, but the spring open ground helps get the temperatures up faster.

 

Another thing that's happening in our areas you can see we're using a lot of science, a lot of technology like global positioning systems.  We rely on a company that sells a global positioning system with a computer hooked up to it that goes across the field and samples the entire field in grids of every so many feet.  That's to allow the more precise application of fertilizers.

 

Also the combines coming through are computerized.  They can tell you what the yields are all the way through a field.  Global positioning is also being used by our aerial applicators, which allows for a more precise placement. 

 

I've heard a lot of things here said today about organic farming.  I have no problem personally with organic farming.  If it works for you, fine.  But keep in mind what a very small percentage of the global food supply is organically produced.  I think we can co-exist if we always have to keep in mind that we are in the business of feeding people and that we must work together.  Thank you.

 

Now we present Melanie Culver from Monsanto.  She is with the soybean business and she's going to talk to us about some of the future developments in store for agriculture. 

 

Melanie Culver:

 

I grew up in west Tennessee in the Delta area.    My grandmother grew up or was a share cropper in that area, nine children.  At the time I think they thought they were very fortunate that they had six sons because they had sons to work on the farm, but I don't think they could have managed without the contribution of the women on the farm.  My grandmother worked pretty hard.  My other grandmother in the 1930s was a star basketball player which is kind of unusual.  So I'm pretty proud of my matriarchal heritage there.

 

My name is Melanie Culver.  I'm not a farmer.  I don't know a lot about farming actually, the actual business of farming.  I work for Monsanto.  I do know about the business of agriculture.  So I'll talk about that a little bit today.

 

Why sustainable agriculture?  I think it might mean different things for different people, but the world's population is growing.  As some areas that have historically been more economically disadvantaged become more economically affluent, dietary preferences are changing.  Many areas people have more meat, will want to eat more meat which requires more feed to be produced.  Again, calling into production more acres of land.  Combine with the loss of environmental resources and the importance of sustainable agriculture becomes pretty clear. 

 

Modern biotechnology can help in many ways.   different people have different feelings about modern biotechnology.  I think there are people who certainly have some concerns, but what it is as I use the term, what I meaning is the transfer of genetic information or DNA from one living organism to another to achieve a desired trait. 

 

First of all we'll discover a gene that we believe have the characteristic that could be important.  Then we'll transform a plant or what we are doing there is inserting that gene into plant tissue.  We'll grow that plant, produce seeds from that plant and make sure that the genetic trait is present and that the plant still functions normally in every other way.  That the only thing that happened was the insertion of the gene into that plant. 

 

Then we'll do breeding to make sure that that genetic trait shows up to the grower in the varieties that they prefer.  At the same time we start our regulatory effort to be able to insure to the public that we've done the right testing and that the products are safe for the market.

 

We see three different waves of products coming to market.  Many of which are enabled to be produced through modern biotechnology.  The first wave are traits that really help with the production of the crop and help production efficiency.

 

The second level there are differentiated crops.  These are crops which have some particular characteristic or what we'll call quality trait in the crop.  The third part is being able to use renewable resources like plants to produce products like a polymer or biopolymer or plastic. 

 

One thing about which I am particularly excited is that the possibility is there to create a lower saturate soybean oil, so there's less saturated fat in vegetable oil. 

 

Plants, I think in the future will be called on to make a number of things that we see conventional steel and mortar kinds of factories making today.  Pharmaceuticals.  Different chemicals, polymers or biofuels.

 

What's new information in our industry today is the rate in which or how quickly we'll be able to bring you those products.  Advances in genomics will accelerate the discovery of the next generation of products.  Genomics is really nothing more than genetic information and understanding genetic information.

 

Seed technology of course has been with us a long time.  You don't get a crop if you don't plant a seed, nothing new to that.  But it's traditionally meant just what's in the background genetics.  It is now the backbone between breeding and genomics and as I think becoming increasingly important.  Biotechnology facilitates the precise modification of traits of interest.  So you can find something very very specific and be able to bring it to a plant via biotechnology.  Once you've actually found a gene it requires less time to bring that product to market.

 

There is also added value for animal producers available through biotechnology.  I think in the near term we'll see a lower cost more sustainable feed, increased animal growth and feed efficiency kind of the next wave and in better human nutritive products probably further out in the future.  Vegetable oils will be easier to digest, less fattening, more quickly converted into energy, so better efficiency and some forms are able to deliver essential fatty acids more effectively.

 

That's just a sampling of what could be possible via biotechnology.  Many of these products are on the market today.  there are many more in various companies' pipelines that are working on this  as I said, you know, hopefully we will be shortening the time to market for those with the advances in science that have occurred.  So you'll see these available quickly.  I think there'll always be a marketplace for organic farming.  I think that there's always going to be a segment of the purchasing public that chooses that method of production.  But I think that choices are very important and are what's going to keep all of us in business over time.

 

Thanks very much.

 

[Applause]

 

QUESTIONS FROM THE AUDIENCE:

 

My name is Sheri Sailer.  I'm with the American Farm Bureau Women's Committee.  I live in Arizona and am a cotton farmer.  I just want to say how much I enjoyed the presentations by all of you this afternoon.  I think that when I came to this Conference the Green Revolution really grabbed my attention because I think we need to be shouting this message from the mountain tops: since 1940 we have tripled food production on the same amount of land which leaves a lot more land for habitat and for other uses.   I think that this is an area that we need to communicate to our urban population who are not aware of this or who choose not to be aware of it.  Because of biotech and the industrial resolution, this is the true environmental message that we have saved land from going under cultivation by producing the food due to biotech and the Green Revolution. 

 

I think also in addition to that message, we need to let people know that pesticides is not a dirty word.  I think a lot of it came out of the old alar scare, if many of you remember that.  Of course later we found out that alar wasn't even a carcinogen.  We in the agricultural community need to be reminded as well that 99% of the pesticides that you and I ingest are naturally occurring in the plant.  God put them there for a reason so you wouldn't have buggy moldy food.

 

Certainly we are living longer, we have the safest food in the world and we're the healthiest we've ever been.  So I think we need to get this message out as well to the consumer, to the population that we are not poisoning people -- that 99% of what they ingest is naturally occurring.  That little bit that we add has been what allowed us to feed ourselves and the world and here in America to spend only 10 or 11% of our disposable income on food. 

 

So I just wanted to add my comments to your comments and applaud you for what you had to share with us today.

 

Questioner 2:

 

I'm Debbie Adams from Australia.  I'd like to thank you for the opportunity of hearing people in other parts of the world combat some of the problems that we too have had in Australia.  My question is addressed to Melanie because I am largely concerned in genetic engineering.  One of the things that I'm always scared about is that there are people out there who don't get the message clearly, who distort the facts  and before something gets off the ground they have crucified it.  I'm wondering if Monsanto can be proactive in getting out this information of the good side of genetic engineering instead of allowing the hype that can arise.

 

Melanie Culver:

 

We certainly try.  It takes a very brave employee to go to some of the meetings that we might be asked to.  I think what people don't necessarily understand is that genetic engineering isn't necessarily creating something that wouldn't have occurred in nature.  It's just keeping it from taking a million years to do so. 

 

Conventional breeding would cross two varieties, then test them for years to figure out what was actually performed.  Now we can apply markers to certain genes very quickly to figure out whether or not they're in that cross.  So it’s not changing the outcome, its just increasing speed in many instances.

 

There is also the opportunity to introduce a gene that's not naturally occurring in the plant.  Like the BT gene, which has greatly reduced the amount of chemical insecticide that has been sprayed on the farm.  As we said insecticides are not necessarily a bad thing, but you don't want to just spray them indiscriminately.  With biotech, you haven't used oil resources to produce pesticide.  You haven't had to package it.  You haven't had to ship it around the country from place to place.  You've certainly reduced farm worker exposure.  So there are a number of benefits. 

 

I think it's important to respect and understand people's concerns and make sure that we hear them and try to address them.  But the more and more we talk about the facts, the more and more I think people have the opportunity to be comfortable with the science behind the technology and that it does produce safe products.