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JUNE 2016 SEEDWORLD.COM 15 Designed to set the standard for plant growth the Percival LED Series offers research chambers that allow for specific control over the one research variable that has eluded precision light MULTI-SPECTRUM LAMP BANK The LED Series provides the correct spectral quality at the correct irradiance with exceptional environmental control every time Helping You Create Better Science www.percival-scientific.com Featuring LED Multi-Spectrum Lamp Bank LEDLEDLEDLEDLEDSeries THE Wally Tyner Purdue University agricultural economist Matin Qaim University of Gttingen international food economist of uncontrolled pest damage. Once farmers switch to those resistant crops they are not only able to reduce pesticide use but they also have more effective pest control and that means higher yields. If a Bt crop can boost yields in the United States by 10 per- cent in many other parts of the world including India China South and West Africa farmers see yield gains of 30 to 40 per- cent and sometimes higher than that Qaims research shows. Take those GM crops away and those benefits disappear as well he says. Its not just their yields that would suffer though. When they switch to growing GMOs they suddenly have 50 to 60 percent higher profits Qaim explains. The reason for that is most of the GMOs are not patented in developing countries. That means the seeds are relatively cheap so farmers use them and gain most of the benefits. In the United States a lot of these seeds are patented which means some of the financial benefits are captured by the innovating companies. Lower profits translate into a lower standard of living for farmers in the developing world if GM seeds are banned. Qaims research on Bt cotton in India tracked a sample of several hun- dred farmers for many years and Bt adoption led to profit gains for these farmers of 50 percent. They had more money to spend on food and other things and overall we found it did contribute significantly to reducing poverty and reducing food insecurity by about 20 percent among those growing cotton Qaim says. GMOs have a real measurable impact on farmers livelihoods at the micro-level. Tyner and his team are working on a GMO study that will take a more global look at what might happen if GMOs were banned. The global study will not only take yield declines into account but will also factor in the effects of increased costs which directly impact standard of living. People tend to fight GMOs because they think only corpo- rations benefit but Bt cotton provides a real-world example of small-scale farmers in India and China benefiting and lifting them- selves out of poverty because of biotechnology Qaim adds. SW