Chinese soybean farmers reap windfall from conventional crops

Chinese soybean producers are finding unexpected windfall growing the conventional crops while farmers across the world are switching in droves to hardy, genetically modified soybeans.

They are worried about the safety of the so-called GMO (genetically modified organisms) products which some have dubbed "Frankenstein food". Says Li Yanmei, vice president of Beijing Gingko-Group Biological Technology Co., which produces Vitamin E from Chinese non-GMO products, "We can’t meet all the orders. Even some US customers pick non-GMO health products that’s how we have decided to produce only non-GMO products."

To quadruple its production capacity, the company is now building a second production line in Beijing. Gingko is one of a handful of Chinese Vitamin E producers that have acquired a GMO-free certificate known as identity preservation certification. This requires strict quality controls for the entire supply chain starting at the farms.

China is, ironically, the world’s top soy importer and buys more than 20 million tons of GMO soybeans each year from the United States and South America for the production of soyoil and soymeal, used mainly for animal feeds.

But it has not allowed its own farmers to plant the biotech oilseed at home. Its non-GMO soybeans, mostly grown in the northeastern provinces, is becoming all the more rare now that Brazil has joined other world top soy producers – the United States and Argentina – to grow GMO soy.

More than 80 percent of the soybeans grown in the United States are herbicide-tolerant GMO Roundup Ready variety, developed by biotechnology giant Monsanto.

Japan and South Korea have long bought Chinese non-GMO soybeans for human consumption. But now the demand is growing for non-GMO soy products from Europe, which introduced strict labeling laws last year.

Explains Chuk Ng of GeneScan, a global leader in biological testing for GMOs with headquarter in Germany. "There is also a growing interest for soy protein. It’s a binder for sausages and ham. China produces non-GMO protein," says the general manager of GeneScan Hong Kong.

Carrefour, the world’s second largest retailer, is planning to develop a non-GMO supply chain for soybeans and rice for its stores.