Brazil will plant 36.6 mn hectares GM crops in 2012/13

The growing use of GM seeds in Brazilian crops is increasing significantly over the years. The planted area with GM seeds in the coming 2012/13 Brazilian crop year (Oct 2012 through Sep 2013) should reach 36.6 million hectares, 12.3 % bigger than in the last planting season, according to USDA’s Agricultural Biotechnology Annual Report. The increase is mostly attributed to higher use of biotech corn due to the increase in approvals of new biotech corn events in Brazil and higher availability of subsidized credit for farmers.

During the 2011/12 crop year, Brazil planted 31.8 million hectares with biotech crops. The adoption rate of biotech soybean seeds reached 85% (21.4 million hectares), cotton biotech seeds 32% (490,000 hectares) and corn biotech seeds 67% (9.9 million hectares split equally into two major distinct growing season – summer and winter crops).

The soybean culture is the most representative GM culture of the country and it should have 88.1% of the crops being GM. The winter crops of corn also show big numbers of GM seeds, having 87.8% of its area covered with transgenic, or 6.9 million hectares.
 
Most of the increase in area will come from biotech corn, which has 19 events currently approved for commercial use. Brazil also has in the pipeline other plant biotech crops waiting for commercial approval, mostly for sugar cane, potatoes, papaya and eucalyptus. As of July 2012, there are 34 genetically engineered crops approved in Brazil: 19 for corn, 9 for cotton, 5 for soybeans, and one for dry edible beans, which although approved in 2011, has not yet been commercialized.

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