Ag rivals team up on global crop issues

Date:10-02-2009

DuPont and Monsanto are tough competitors when it comes to selling seed to farmers, but the two companies are uniting to promote high-tech agriculture as a way of meeting rising global food needs.

DuPont, parent company of Pioneer Hi-Bred of Johnston, and its rival have joined agribusiness companies Archer Daniels Midland and Deere in forming a coalition called the Global Harvest Initiative.

Ellen Kullman, chief executive of DuPont, said Tuesday that the companies have a common interest in promoting policies that will ease the way for their products to be used globally to increase crop production.

"Were going to get further faster if we collectively create a dialogue and get the issues on the table and see where we need to work to increase research or get policies changed or work on the trade side," Kullman said while attending a one-day symposium sponsored by the companies.

"Its a competitive industry and we compete vigorously. At the same time we have the same goals."

Among those goals: getting countries to implement biotechnology-friendly regulations for genetically modified crops.

Monsanto and Pioneer are in a legal battle with each other over herbicide-tolerance traits in corn and soybean seeds.

But the biotech industry in general also has a shared public relations problem.

Monsanto, in particular, is the frequent target of critics who object to genetically engineering corps or accuse the company of unfairly driving up farm production costs.

Critics also say the agribusiness companies are pushing chemical-intensive agriculture and biotechnology.

The U.S. Working Group on the Food Crisis, which includes the National Family Farm Coalition and the Pesticide Action Network, said the companies conference Tuesday was "rehashing failed solutions from the past."

Appearing on a panel with Kullman and the CEOs of Deere and ADM, Monsantos chief executive, Hugh Grant, said the companies need to work together and with nongovernmental organizations to increase food production.

Economists say food production needs to double in the next 40 years. In that period, climate change is expected to bring more frequent and severe droughts to parts of the world already struggling to feed their populations.

"Agriculture is going to have to adapt," said University of Illinois economist Robert Thompson. Water needs to be used more efficiently, and "were going to need adaptive plant and animal breeding," he said.

Monsanto and Pioneer are working on developing drought-tolerant crops, including corn. But those crops are aimed primarily to farmers in the United States and other developing countries who can afford to pay for them.

Monsanto has contributed some of its research to a project funded by the Gates Foundation in Kenya to develop drought-tolerant corn for use in Africa. Grant said the aim is to have the African seeds ready at the same time the drought-tolerant corn is commercialized in the United States.

"If youre going to launch these things in Iowa, and they are going to be very significant products, you better figure out how you are going to launch these things in Africa," Grant said.

But Kullman said drought-tolerant crops seeds arent enough by themselves to increase food production in Africa, where farmers often lack essentials such as fertilizer or roads to get their crops to market.

"Twenty years from now we can go back and things might not look so different," she said.