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Michigan | EMBRAPA TO ASSIST MINISTRY OF AGRIC TO MONITOR UNCERTIFIED SEEDS
The Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) has announced plans to assist the Ministry of Agriculture in monitoring soybean fields to ensure only certified biotech soybean seeds were used for planting. The monitoring system will avail of the use of satellites to register images of plantations every 15 days, able to detect unregistered, illegal soybean fields. Seeds used for planting must have a known origin, be certified, and be registered with the Ministry of Agriculture to be legal.
Ywao Miyamoto, the president of Brazil's Seed Producers Association (Abrasem) explained that uncertified seeds are available at a lesser cost in the black market, and are often purchased by farmers in good faith. However, uncertified seeds sometimes fail to germinate, and on average 75 kilos of illegal seeds per hectare are required instead of 50 kilos per hectare of certified seeds. Certified seeds also have a guarantee of “health, pureness, and germination”. The price of approved seeds also includes royalties to the companies who developed them. One of these, in Brazil, is EMBRAPA. Royalties are required to fund further research aimed at improving agricultural production.
Read the full article at:
http://www.agenciabrasil.gov.br/noticias/2006/10/21/
materia.2006-10-21.2990835881/?searchterm=sementes
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Satelites being used in Brazil to detect illegal seed
