Inventing Makhathini: Creating a prototype for the dissemination of genetically modified crops into Africa

Schnurr, Matthew A.

doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2012.01.005

Cited by 27 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 34 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, when applied with insufficient attention to local context, these imaginaries can result in inaccurate knowledge claims. Literature promoting GM crops has been duly criticized for depending 'upon an analysis that disembeds the technology from the technical, social and institutional contexts in which it is applied' (Glover, 2010a, p. 955;also Stone, 2011;Tripp, 2009;Schnurr, 2012Schnurr, , 2019Dowd-Uribe, 2017;Flachs, 2019). This article considers how both activists and promoters relied on disembedded agrarian imaginaries and scripts about GM crops while paying insufficient attention to local context.…”

Section: Debates Over Gm Crops and Peasant Essentialismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Peasant essentialism in GMO debates: Bt cotton in Burkina Faso

Luna

2020

Journal of Agrarian Change

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Amidst polarized global debates about genetically modified (GM) crops, much attention has focused on Burkina Faso, where farmers grew Bt cotton from 2008 to 2015 in the first widespread commercial adoption of GM crops by smallholder African farmers. This article draws on ethnographic fieldwork and 125 interviews to analyse the debate accompanying this adoption, contending that both sides employed stock agrarian imaginaries that essentialized rural people. These competing imaginaries—romantic versus modern—reproduced polarized global narratives about GM crops and peasants, while misrepresenting or overlooking the inequalities and constraints shaping rural communities and the specifics of Bt cotton production. Both sides sought to claim the legitimacy and authenticity that comes from representing ‘the peasants’, yet ironically flattened the complexity of rural experiences. This paper demonstrates how each side's adherence to agrarian imaginaries served to produce erroneous knowledge claims. This adherence resulted in part from local resource constraints and dependence on external actors, which produced pressure to conform to polarized global GMO scripts. The paper concludes that GMO debate participants and observers must eschew essentializing imaginaries if they seek to produce more accurate knowledge about farmers' varied experiences with GM crops.

show abstract

Section: Debates Over Gm Crops and Peasant Essentialismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Peasant essentialism in GMO debates: Bt cotton in Burkina Faso

Luna

2020

Journal of Agrarian Change

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Enthusiasm around the possibilities of using GM techniques to improve agricultural production in Uganda first piqued around the year 2000. At that point, South Africa was the only country on the continent to have commercialised GM technology, and news of Bt cotton's early success there—especially among smallholder farmers in the Makhathini Flats—generated much enthusiasm about the possibility for biotechnology to improve Ugandan agriculture (Schnurr, ). A few years earlier, the Uganda Council on Science and Technology, with support from the United Nations Environment Programme's Global Environment Facility (UNEP‐GEF), had initiated a baseline study on the establishment of a national biotechnology and biosafety framework, which identified the lack of regulatory capacity as a key hurdle to assessing the potential of agricultural biotechnology to improve Ugandan agriculture (Policy Official 4, 2 June 2009).…”

Section: The Ugandan Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Getting to ‘Yes’: Governing Genetically Modified Crops in Uganda

Schnurr

Gore

2014

J of Intl Development

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper critically examines the evolution of the regulatory regime to review and manage the potential social, environmental and health risks associated with the introduction of genetically modified organisms in Uganda. It reveals how and why institutions responsible for governing genetically modified crops have evolved over time and the implications of this progression. The paper investigates the inter-relationships that connect the various elements of genetically modified organism regulation, arguing that current policy and legislative efforts are the results of the early establishment of institutions and processes tailored towards the eventual endorsement of these technologies.

show abstract

“…Adopting farmers are either still using significant numbers of insecticide applications to control secondary pests, or the damage caused by these pests has increased. Some examples include South Africa (Hofs et al ., ; Schnurr, ), Burkina Faso (Dowd‐Uribe, ), Pakistan (Jaleel et al ., ), Australia (Wilson et al ., ), Brazil (Sujii et al ., ) and Mexico (Traxler and Godoy‐Avila, ).…”

Section: Impact Of Secondary Pests On Bt Cropsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The impact of secondary pests on Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) crops

Catarino

Ceddia

Areal

et al. 2015

Plant Biotechnology Journal

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

SummaryThe intensification of agriculture and the development of synthetic insecticides enabled worldwide grain production to more than double in the last third of the 20th century. However, the heavy dependence and, in some cases, overuse of insecticides has been responsible for negative environmental and ecological impacts across the globe, such as a reduction in biodiversity, insect resistance to insecticides, negative effects on nontarget species (e.g. natural enemies) and the development of secondary pests. The use of recombinant DNA technology to develop genetically engineered insect-resistant crops could mitigate many of the negative side effects of insecticides. One such genetic alteration enables crops to express toxic crystalline (Cry) proteins from the soil bacteria Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt). Despite the widespread adoption of Bt crops, there are still a range of unanswered questions concerning longer term agro-ecosystem interactions. For instance, insect species that are not susceptible to the expressed toxin can develop into secondary pests and cause significant damage to the crop. Here, we review the main causes surrounding secondary pest dynamics in Bt crops and the impact of such outbreaks. Regardless of the causes, if nonsusceptible secondary pest populations exceed economic thresholds, insecticide spraying could become the immediate solution at farmers' disposal, and the sustainable use of this genetic modification technology may be in jeopardy. Based on the literature, recommendations for future research are outlined that will help to improve the knowledge of the possible long-term ecological trophic interactions of employing this technology.

show abstract

Inventing Makhathini: Creating a prototype for the dissemination of genetically modified crops into Africa

Cited by 27 publications

References 34 publications

Peasant essentialism in GMO debates: Bt cotton in Burkina Faso

Peasant essentialism in GMO debates: Bt cotton in Burkina Faso

Getting to ‘Yes’: Governing Genetically Modified Crops in Uganda

The impact of secondary pests on Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) crops

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About