Articles

2,4-D crops: An unsustainable techno-fix for the failure of herbicide-tolerant GM crops

Author: Antje Lorch

Publisher: TWN

Year Published: 2016

Why old herbicides are returning

“Less herbicides, less toxic herbicides, protecting the environment and farm workers from impacts of agro-chemicals, stopping soil erosion.” Those were the slogans to promote the

first generation of genetically modified (GM) crops, engineered to be tolerant to herbicides. This envisioned golden future was all too brief, however, and is in fact already past. After the introduction of Monsanto’s Roundup Ready crops – tolerant to the herbicide glyphosate – in the USA and a few other countries, weeds soon became resistant to glyphosate and have posed increasing problems to farmers. Instead of stepping back from herbicide-tolerant crops, the GM industry is now stepping up the

development of new GM crops that are tolerant to multiple – and often older, more toxic – herbicides. Among them: GM crops engineered to be tolerant to 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D).