Pampanga farmers planting GM corn variety

MEXICO, Pampanga — Barangay Anao here may well be called the "Bt corn capital" of the country

The reason: All of its 145 farmers are planting the genetically modified (GM) Bacillus thuringiensis or Bt corn.

Bt is a bacterium that naturally occurs in soil. Through biotechnology or genetic engineering, a specific gene of Bt has been inserted in the corn variety.

The Bt corn produces its natural pesticide against the Asian corn borer, one of the most destructive pests attacking corn in Asia, including the Philippines.

Over the past half-decade, the controversial corn variety has excited the interest of many Filipino corn farmers because of its high yield and resistance to the dreaded Asian corn borer.

This, notwithstanding the persistent — and sometimes violent — opposition posed by anti-GM groups that included some Church groups, non-government organizations, and members of the academic and science communities.

In the face of this opposition, however, many farmers across the country took the cudgels for the new corn type, attesting that they have been considerably benefiting from it.

The farmers asserted that they are the ones tilling the land and planting the crop and it is they who will decide whether they will adopt the GM/Bt technology or not.

The corn growers of Anao are among today’s advocates of Bt corn, asserting that it holds great promise of extricating them from the quagmire of poverty that they have been in all these years.

They expressed optimism over the new technology and their sentiments against those who are preventing its adoption by the farming sector before recent visitors to Anao from eight countries — China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the United States, and the Philippines.

The visitors were farmer-leaders and biotech crop growers, researchers, and media practitioners (including this writer) who attended the international workshop on "Farmer Biotech Outreach: Strengthening the Competitiveness of Small Farmers" held at the InterContinental Hotel in Makati City.

The conference was sponsored by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture-Biotechnology Information Center (SEARCA-BIG), and Asian Farmers Regional Network (ASFARNET), and supported by the US government through the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

The Anao farmers said they can now look forward to a more bountiful future as they, like the legendary phoenix, rise from the ashes of Mt. Pinatubo that mantled their farms in the early 1990s.

Anao was once part of a hacienda placed under land reform in the 70s. There are 485 hectares of farmlands in the barangay at present, of which 433 hectares are planted to Bt corn.

"Anao was once a ‘no man’s land’ after the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo," a barangay resident recalled during an open forum with the foreign visitors after they had visited the lush Bt cornfields in the village.

Now, it is green again, and the villagers are happy that Bt corn has come around.

Another resident expressed optimism that the high-yielding and pest-resistant corn variety can turn the tide of young people of the village leaving the farms and heading for the cities and centers of population in search of better-paying jobs.

A resident, in answer to the question posed by this writer, lamented that many of Anao’s youths are leaving the farms because of the low income derived from tilling them.

But the situation is much brighter now because of the new corn variety, the farmers said.

An Anao barangay leader reported that a genetically modified corn variety can yield as much as 10 tons per hectare, more than double than the four to five tons per hectare from ordinary corn varieties.

In one season (more than three months), a farmer using the GM corn variety can earn as much as P100,000.

Another Anao farmer said he can now send his children to college because of his bountiful harvest from Bt corn.