ISLAMABAD: International agencies have started providing imported hybrid corn and wheat seeds to Pakistan to replace its indigenous varieties free of cost.

This generosity has met more resistance instead of being welcomed by most agriculture scientists and small farmers. Besides other fears linked with the imported seeds produced by multinational companies, the experts are against replacing Pakistan’s indigenous seeds of corn and wheat.

They argue that the move will give complete control of Pakistan’s agriculture sector to multinational companies. “We are particularly worried about cross-pollination. Sown side by side, the imported seeds can easily cross pollinate with local varieties and contaminate Pakistan’s indigenous seeds. This is particularly true for corn which is a highly cross-pollinating crop,” said a senior official at the Pakistan Agriculture Research Council (PARC).

Agriculture scientists and farmers also believe that seeds produced in other countries might not be compatible with Pakistani environment.

The agriculture experts at PARC fear that seeds produced in a foreign environment/country could bring in new pest and crop diseases as witnessed in the past with imported banana and cotton.

Say imported seeds can cross pollinate with local varieties and contaminate them

Their reasons carry more weight since Pakistan lacks the resources, facilities and trained manpower to test the imported seeds. “Pakistan has no bio-safety laws or regulatory bodies to monitor and regulate the imported seeds for its germination quality to ascertain if it is free of foreign crop diseases or genetically modified or non-genetically modified,” said Agriculture Forum Pakistan Chairman Dr Ibrahim Mughal.

He added: “Pakistani farmers also lack space to grow imported varieties on a trial basis. Trials are run at least 300 metres away from the regular crop to prevent contamination of other crops.”

Besides the fact that Pakistan might not have indigenous seeds to fall back upon in case imported varieties replace locally produced seeds, one of the biggest concerns among the farmers’ community and agriculture scientists is that hybrid and genetically-modified seeds can pass into the system unnoticed like it did with Pakistani Basmatti rice in 2012 as pointed out by the European Union. The EU issued five warnings to Pakistan when it found traces of genetically-modified organism in Basmatti in 2012.

International agencies and foreign aid organisations in Pakistan argue that the imported hybrid seeds will give better yield and help Pakistan ensure its food security. Hybrids are produced by deliberate cross-pollinating two different parent varieties from same species of crops. They can only be used or sown once, increasing the dependency on the producers of hybrid seeds.

The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre is one such agency providing imported seeds to both public and private sector seed organisations.

Its country head Dr Mohammad Imtiaz asserts that the mission was to replace 25 to 50 years old seed varieties being used by small farmers in Pakistan with the best quality imported hybrid seeds.

“Quality seed is grown in Mexico. About 50 to 100 grams is imported and provided to research institutions in the agriculture sector. They tested quality in field. The trials are conducted for five to six years before being approved by the government and sold to farmers in the markets.”

According to Dr Imtiaz, imported seeds have already been provided to flood-hit areas and tribal regions where food requirements were becoming a priority.

When contacted, Director General Federal Seed Certification Dr Shakeel Ahmed argued that importing seeds produced by multinational companies in foreign environments was nothing new.

“International agencies have been supplying seeds to Pakistan since the country came into being,” he added.

But agriculture scientists and producers wondered what was the purpose of spending significant amounts on local research if at the end farmers were to be sold imported seeds rather than developing local varieties.

“Imported coarse varieties from India and China have virtually destroyed local Basmati and other varieties. By importing cotton and corn, are we not repeating the same problem?” Dr Mughal added.

Dr Shahida Wizarat, the head of the economics department at the Institute of Business Management, Karachi, said, “The government needs to reject all seeds imported from countries such as Philippines, India, Thailand, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh etc.” If not, she added, the government should ensure at least years of trials before commercialising the imported seeds.

She added: “Why are developed countries selling hybrid and genetically-modified seed varieties to Pakistan, which they would not allow to be consumed in their own countries?”

The Seed (Amendment) Act 2014 allows import of genetically-modified and hybrid seed varieties. However, the Act does not cater to any health or environmental hazards that imported genetically-modified and hybrid seeds may cause.

Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2014