Laramie, Wyoming
May 1, 2007
A court decision temporarily
halting the planting of genetically-engineered alfalfa could
hurt Wyoming production, according to researchers in the
University of Wyoming's
College of Agriculture.
 "We're
a top state in producing the Roundup Ready seed for companies,
and this could impact our alfalfa seed growers," says Stephen D.
Miller, associate dean in the College of Agriculture and
director of the Wyoming Agricultural Experiment Station. Miller
and colleagues Andrew Kniss, Craig Alford and Robert Wilson have
performed research on Roundup Ready alfalfa.
Robin Groose, an associate professor in UW's Department of Plant
Sciences, agrees with Miller the decision could affect Wyoming
production.
"It's unclear what the effect of the judge's ruling would be at
this point, but alfalfa is our most important crop," Groose
says.
Wyoming, according to the U.S.
Department of Agriculture (USDA, produced 1.5 million tons
of alfalfa for forage in 2005, grown on approximately 600,000
acres. It also produced 3.47 million pounds of alfalfa seed from
5,600 acres. The value of the 2005 alfalfa crop was nearly $113
million.
Comments by Miller and Groose are in response to a preliminary
injunction issued by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer of San
Francisco, whose ruling stemmed from a lawsuit against the USDA.
Farmers who already had purchased the herbicide-resistant
alfalfa seed must have planted it by March 30. No new sales of
Roundup Ready alfalfa seed will be allowed until the case is
resolved, according to the judge's preliminary injunction.
The seed, produced by St. Louis, Mo.-based Monsanto Co. and
Forage Genetics International of Nampa, Idaho, is resistant to
herbicides including Roundup weed killer manufactured by
Monsanto.
Groose says genetically produced seed would help in weed
control.
"From an economic standpoint, Roundup Ready seed would benefit
the growers who would want to use it," he says.
The judge ruled the federal government failed to fully consider
the public health, economic and environmental consequences
before allowing the sale of Roundup Ready alfalfa.
The Center for Food
Safety, a non-profit public interest and environmental
advocacy group with offices in Washington, D.C., and San
Francisco, sued on behalf of farmers who complained the seed
could contaminate organic and conventional alfalfa.
Miller says it could take months for a decision, and that could
hurt Wyoming's seed producers this year.
Miller, Kniss, a research scientist in the Department of Plant
Sciences, Alford, a former associate research scientist in the
department, and Wilson, an adjunct professor with the department
and an extension weed specialist with the University of
Nebraska-Lincoln in Scottsbluff, Neb., published a bulletin on
Roundup Ready alfalfa available at
www.uwyo.edu/CES/PUBS/B1173.pdf. |
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