Topic > Importance of LMOs in Malaysia - 581

Many Malaysian citizens are still not familiar with LMO. According to a survey conducted by Carpenter (2010), it was found that a third world country like India produced a 150% improvement in Bt cotton yield from 2005 to 2006 and 2007 to 2008, benefiting farmers. This result shows a positive impact on economic performance, as improved yield would increase economic gain and solve financial problems for poor countries by reducing handling, labor and equipment costs. In the United States, planting glyposate-tolerant GM soybeans is advantageous over growing conventional soybeans in terms of shorter timescales and lower costs required (Carpenter, 2010). This phenomenon was offset by the fact that genetically modified crops used more than 318 million pesticides than conventional crops in the first thirteen years from 1996 to 2008 (Benbrook, 2009). Although it reduced pesticide use for the first three years, it then slowly increased each year until 20% in 2008. This phenomenon was caused by the rapid spread of glyphosate-resistant weeds. In addition to this, the cultivation of cotton, soybeans and...