Plant Biotechnology Improves Wildlife Habitat, Water Quality
Council for Biotechnology Information
July 19, 2007
Excerpt…
No-till conservation practices have increased 35 percent since biotech crops came on the market in 1996.
Biotechnology has helped spur further adoption of environmentally beneficial conservation tillage practices, according to a study released Oct. 23 by an Indiana-based nonprofit group whose mission is to promote soil and water quality.
The benefits range from improved habitat for birds such as pheasants and bobwhite quail to cleaner drinking water and a reduction in harmful greenhouse gases and fuel use.
“An analysis of surveys conducted since the introduction of herbicide-tolerant crops strongly supports the conclusion that these crops developed through plant biotechnology are facilitating the continued expansion of conservation tillage, especially no-till,” said the study titled “Conservation Tillage and Plant Biotechnology: How New Technologies Can Improve the Environment By Reducing the Need to Plow.”
The study was written by Richard Fawcett, an environmental specialist with Farm Journal magazine and a former agronomy professor at Iowa State University, and Dan Towery, a natural resource specialist with the national Conservation Technology Information Center, which has ties to Purdue University in Indiana. It said that since biotech crops were first commercially grown in the United States in 1996, no-till conservation acreage has grown by 35 percent.
“There is a clear association between sustainable tillage practices and biotech crops,” said the study, noting that nearly three-fourths of no-till soybean acres — and 86 percent of no-till cotton acres — were planted with biotech varieties.
Conservation tillage is defined as any tillage and planting system that leaves more than 30 percent of the soil covered with crop residue to prevent erosion. There are several types of conservation tillage systems — no-till, ridge-till and mulch-till — with no-till being the best for the environment because the soil is left virtually undisturbed from harvest to planting, reducing erosion by 90 percent or more. In contrast, conventional-tillage leaves less than 15 percent of the soil covered with residue.
Full article at Council for Biotechnology Information.
