The global knowledge encounter: a sociological analysis of the introduction of genetically modied seed in Warangal, India

Ashok Kumbamu
Since the introduction of green revolution Pradesh in southern India, where I conducted technologies into Indian agriculture, the adop- my ethnographic eld research in 2006 is used, as tion of high-yielding varieties and associated an explanatory case study. crop management practices has become a key issue in the debates about production and socioecological rural transformations.1 For over 50 Diffusion and dispossession years, many studies have examined the socioeconomic and political implications of the Modernisation theorists claim that traditional spread of new agricultural technologies for (developing) societies can be transformed into millions of farmers in developing countries in modern (developed) societies by changing the forces and relations of production general and in India in partias well as by transforming cular. But in these studies Ashok Kumbamu is a doctoral candidate and remolding archaic social little emphasis has been in the Department of Sociology at the structures that resist technoplaced on the sociological University of Alberta, Canada. His PhD logical change in these societhesis work focuses on the adoption of and cultural aspects of farmer ties (Parayil 2002, p.117). genetically modied crops and its sociodecision-making in the adopecological implications for farmers in They unequivocally suggest tion of the new technologies, Canada and India. His recent publications that so-called developing their receptivity to new cropare Ecological modernization and the countries should welcome ping methods, the inforgene revolution: the case study of Bt the diffusion of western cotton in India, in Capitalism Nature mation gap between the knowledge, skills, instituSocialism, December 2006 and a discuslaboratory and the peasant sion piece on agricultural deskilling in tions, values, technology farmer and the impact of Current Anthropology, December 2007. and capital (which, they knowledge-based genetically His latest article, entitled Subaltern argue, have made the west modied (GM) cropping on strategies and autonomous community economically successful). local knowledge systems. building, was published in the CommuAnthropologist Elizabeth nity Development Journal in July 2009. He This article examines the has also published several book chapters Bird describes the assumpfollowing questions: How do and reviews in the eld of development tions of western architects of socioeconomic and cultural and globalisation. development thus: factors inuence farmers in Email: akumbamu@ualberta.ca adopting GM seed? How do First, that these development farmers perceive, value and understand the new agricultural technologies? What are their planners know what the people in the developing implications for agricultural (de)skilling on the countries want; second, that what they want is what we have; third, that they are not yet advanced enough to be one hand, and the metabolic relationship able to fully indulge themselves with repercussions; and between farm community and nature, on the fourth, that discipline, prudence and forbearance are some other? The spread of GM cotton seed in the of the qualities necessary to success.(quoted in Escobar Kadavendi village of Warangal district, Andhra 1995, p. 159)

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The rationale of the global diffusion of technical knowledge or know-how assumes that people in developing countries are incapable of innovating and developing the new technologies needed to solve their problems. The authors of the World development report 1998/99 state: Poor countries and poor people differ from rich ones not only because they have less capital but because they have less knowledge. Knowledge is often costly to create, and that is why much of it is created in industrial countries (World Bank 1999, p. 3). According to World Bank pundits, knowledge is like light. Weightless and intangible, it can easily travel the world, enlighten the lives of people everywhere (World Bank 1999, p. 3). The banal assumption that the diffusion of technical knowledge will result in harmonious development among socioeconomic groups and classes irrespective of their specic cultural and historical contexts has led critics to label technological diffusion a monocultural and Eurocentric project that aims at the creation of homogenisation by ignoring sociocultural diversity in developing societies (Nederveen Pieterse 2001, p. 98; So 1990, p. 33). According to Escobar (1995, p. 12) such stereotypical and ahistorical views about peoples capacities to innovate and create the new knowledge systems in developing countries depoliticise the real problems and obscure root causes of underdevelopment such as colonial and neocolonial exploitation, the domination of multinational corporations (MNCs), unequal international trade relations and stringent patent systems (So 1990, p. 58). For Escobar, the diffusion of western knowledge in the form of development projects marginalises and disqualies non-western knowledge systems and promotes cultural violence on the Third World (Escobar 1995, p.13; see also Escobar 1992). Along similar lines, Indian eco-feminist and erce technology critic Vandana Shiva argues that western science and technology are the results of Enlightenment thinking and positivism, which promotes the notions of mastering nature and destroying the harmonious relationship between nature and society (Shiva 1991). New technologies introduced from the green revolution to the gene revolution provide a classic example of the diffusionist approach

associated with modernisation, which assumes that technology diffusion will address the problems of non-innovative and backward agriculture in the developing world (see Parayil 2002, pp.123129; Yapa 1993, p.265). Indeed, the adoption of the new technologies has been projected as a rational choice by farmers, and adopters are viewed as progressive or gentlemen farmers, as well as active agents of social change and development in the countryside (Parayil 2002, p.143). Yet, since the inception of the green revolution in the early 1960s, several agrarian scholars have shown how the new agricultural technologies have been used as an instrument for the penetration of capital into agriculture, creating social as well as ecological contradictions and accelerating a process of differentiation among the peasantry. Like a treadmill, the differentiated agrarian structure and associated asymmetrical power relations have increased the spread of the new technologies (Byres 1972, 1981; Dasgupta 1977; Frankel 1971; Grifn 1979; Harriss 1987; Shiva 1991). Radical political economists argue that with the advent of GM seed there has been a growing trend towards the commodication of both agricultural inputs and outputs, the consolidation of the seed industry and the monopolisation of research and development. Thus the new technologies have been used as an instrument to reproduce inequalities in society and dependency relations between the countries that develop the new technologies and the countries that adopt them (Kloppenburg 1988; Yearley 1988). The development of biotechnology has intensied the control of MNCs over agriculture in developing societies through the commodication of crops tradable in the international market, as well as the means of production, that is, the seed. But as long as the peasant farmers collect and save seed from their own eld for future use, there is little chance for capital to commodify the seed once and for all. The natural characteristics of the seed constitute a biological barrier to its commodication (Goodman and Redclift 1991, p. 92). To this end, biotechnology has been chosen to make the means of production (seed) into essential commodities on the one hand, while on the other the patent system has been adapted to safeguard

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corporate prots. In other words, the corporate sector has been using both biological and judicial mechanisms to tighten its grip over agriculture in developing societies (see Goodman and Redclift 1991, pp.9093). The gene revolution in the current era of neoliberal globalisation appears to be exacerbating the lopsided development between the core and the periphery. According to Shiva (2001, p.69), for the farmer, the seed is not just merely a source of future plants/food; it is the storage place of culture, of history. The seed is the storehouse of local farming knowledge systems. Local knowledge systems in peasant agriculture include knowledge of the physical environment, biological folk taxonomies (or classication systems), best farming practices and the experimental nature of all this knowledge (Altieri 1990, p.553). The selection, collection and preservation of seed and their use according to geophysical or agro-climatic conditions, is an accumulated knowledge source passed on through generations (Sillitoe 1998, p.229). Acquiring, retaining and sharing the local knowledge of nature and production processes constitute the nub of agricultural skill. In agriculture, the process of skilling is one of the key aspects in socio-ecological sustainability. Moreover, such local knowledge systems are not owned by any private individual or company but are developed as a collective knowledge system. The sharing of collective knowledge promotes interdependency among the farmers and binds them together, fortifying their social relations. Furthermore, preserving local knowledge through sociocultural practices reproduces and enhances the intimate interaction between the primary producer and nature. Indeed, ones expertise in the practical knowledge of agriculture boosts ones self-esteem, enhances ones social status and improves ones bargaining power in the locality, because this knowledge is embedded in everyday sociocultural practices that provide social status. In a community where the farmers save and share the seed the interdependent community relations act as social channels for moving the information in the skilling process of future generations (Stone 2002, p.619). But when the seed becomes a commodity in the external relations of a community, it also becomes, by

extension, a commodity in the internal life of the community. Commodication makes the skilling process obsolete and could eventually lead to the weakening of community relations. For that matter, the commodication of anything in a community dismantles the existing social relations around it and creates new social relations that reinforce the further commodication of other things in the community. Seed commodication makes the farmer a passive recipient of knowledge because where farmers cannot use their collective knowledge system to develop new seed, the attrition of local varieties leads to the deskilling of the farmers (Stone 2002, p.619). Because farmers are the keepers of biodiversity, the experts on local landscapes and waterscapes, the everyday interactants with nature and the organic environmentalists who know the art of living by maintaining sustainable relationships with nature, the process of dispossessing farmers of their agricultural knowledge is an unsustainable one, according to some critics, with severe socioecological implications. Thus, the diffusion of global knowledge systems such as biotechnology is neither neutral nor banal. It dispossesses local knowledge systems and widens the rift between primary agricultural producers and nature. The case study of Kadavendi will help us better understand the sociology of the process of adopting new seed and the implications of the alienation of agricultural producers from their means of production, knowledge systems and nature.

The adoption of GM seed in Kadavendi

In 2006 the total number of households in the village was 1,406, of which 1,138 were farmers and 268 landless. Kadavendi was traditionally a rice growing village in Devaruppla mandal (sub-district) in Warangal district and the farmers had been using several varieties of local seed for generations. In the mid-1970s, however, they adopted hybrid rice varieties. In the late 1970s, after the widespread adoption of hybrid rice seed, Andhra settlers (Guntur Reddies), immigrants from the coastal Andhra region and the early adopters of the new rice seed, introduced cotton cultivation into the village. At rst the settler

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minority farmers cultivated indigenous (desi) seed varieties but in the early 1980s, when cotton cultivation began to emerge as a cash crop in the district, they adopted hybrid cotton seed such as Hybrid-4 (H-4) and Varalaxmi. By the-mid 1980s all the local cotton varieties in the village had been replaced by a few hybrid varieties. Since then the social organisation and conditions of production in the village have been remarkably transformed. The total area under cultivation has increased to meet the demands of a rising population, and agricultural land use has changed from rice paddies to cotton growing. The use of groundwater, fertilisers and pesticides has also increased because the new seed required them more than the traditional varieties. Consequently, all these activities resulted in deep socio-ecological crises, including increased debt due to increased costs of production, increased ecological challenges because of the depletion of soil fertility and the water table and increased health problems because of working in elds that were heavily sprayed with pesticides and the consumption of contaminated water and food. Nevertheless, farmers in the village are still overwhelmingly (85 per cent of all the farmers) growing cotton, in the hope that one good crop may help them to come out of the debt trap. Since the public irrigation system was not well developed and maintained in the village, the farmers started digging bore wells to acquire more water. This initiated the privatisation of groundwater, which led to unhealthy competition among the farmers to dig deeper bore wells and tap more underground water. The result of this competition was a remarkable increase of tube bore wells in the village. In fact, many farmers invested huge amounts of money in order to dig and maintain bore wells and consequently became heavily indebted. Moreover, the rapid increase of bore wells has gradually resulted in the depletion of the water table and has pushed farmers to dig even deeper (at least 200 feet) to extract the water. The depletion of the water table has created water scarcity not only for agriculture but also for human and animal consumption. Moreover, water from all sources has been uorinated, with serious health implications for the majority, who cannot afford to buy bottled water every day.

The increase of the net area under non-food cultivation has also gradually decreased the scale of grazing land, with a resultant decrease in the amount of livestock in the village. The decrease in domestic animals has serious implications for subsistence farmers. It has reduced their use of livestock manure and has increased dependency on chemical fertilisers. It has also increased the use of tractors in the place of bullock-carts and cattle ploughs. Since all agricultural inputs (such as seed, fertilisers, pesticides, labour power, water and machinery) are commodied, farmers need money (capital) to buy them. To meet farm as well as household expenses, farmers have to cultivate commercial crops for the market. Bt cotton seed was rst introduced into the village of Kadavendi by Mahyco Monsanto in 2003, with the assertion that Bt cotton would increase productivity and reduce dependency on pesticides, thereby alleviating economic and environmental problems. The adoption rate of Bt cotton in Kadavendi has been astonishing. In 2003 only 14 farmers adopted it, but in just 4 years the number went up to 892. By 2006, of all cotton farmers (964), 892 (93 per cent) cultivated Bt cotton and only 72 cultivated non-Bt cotton. Overall, 78 per cent of all farmers in the village have adopted Bt cotton so far. Though rates of adoption vary according to the size of each farm (see Table 1) by 2006 most farmers in all categories had adopted Bt cotton: 84 per cent of marginal farmers, 91 per cent of small farmers, 99 per cent of semi-medium and medium farmers, and 100 per cent of large farmers.

Factors inuencing the adoption of Bt cotton

To introduce new seed and to convince farmers to adopt them, companies use various marketing strategies. The major factors that inuenced farmers to adopt Bt cotton in Kadavendi were seed company mobile campaigns, eld demonstrations, farmers advocacy and social networks and seed merchantfarmer networks. When asked about the factors that most inuenced them to adopt Bt cotton, the most common answer was their mounting burden of debt and their desperate situation which led

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Cotton cultivators as % of all farmers in 2006

Table 2: Factors inuencing the initial adoption of Bt cotton 87 100 100 100 85 63 S. No Inuences Bt cotton farmers (%) 7 43 29 21

Common factor: debt burden 1 Company mobile campaigns and media advertisements 2 Field demonstrations and perceived success of big farmers 3 Farmers advocacy and social networks 4 Seed merchants and dealers Source: Field research

Total cotton farmers in 2006 (N)

386 296

199

Non-Bt cotton farmers as % of all cotton cultivators in 2006

16

9 1

0 7

3 964

80

Bt cotton adopters as % of all cotton cultivators in 2006

them to try a new product. When asked for more specic reasons for their initial adoption, only 7 per cent of the farmers reported that they had adopted Bt cotton because of the inuence of company advertisements and mobile campaigns. My research found that the major inuencing factors (for 43 per cent of the adopters) were eld demonstrations and the perceived success of big farmers in the village. Other factors such as farmers advocacy and social networks inuenced 29 per cent of the adopters and the seed merchants and dealers inuenced 21 per cent of the adopters. We will examine each factor in turn (see Table 2).

Non-Bt cotton farmers, 2006 (N)

32

35 4

100 93

84

91 99

99

0 72

2003 2004 2005 2006 (N) (N) (N) (N)

167

351 292

Farmers who adopted Bt cotton

3 892

79

Seed company advertisements and mobile campaigns

Every year, well before sowing season starts (that is, between May and June), seed company campaigners regularly go from village to village in jeeps or vans to introduce the new seed. In Kadavendi the farmers came to know about Bt cotton for the rst time through company mobile campaigns in 2003. In the campaigns special emphasis is placed on the agronomic ` -vis non-Bt cotton benets of Bt cotton vis-a varieties. In fact, Bt cotton was projected as a solution to the problems associated with non-Bt cotton, such as heavy bollworm attacks, a huge application of pesticides and poor yields. The basic tools of mobile campaigns are pamphlets, posters, billboards and live speeches by trained campaigners. In addition, companies regularly broadcast commercial advertisements of the new seed on local television and radio. Although the seed campaigns were not entirely new to the farmers they are always tempted to

181 149

Table 1: Adoption of Bt cotton in Kadavendi, 20032006

11 16

19 9 80

Farmers in the village 2006 (N)

3 1138 Source: Field research

316

Farmer category based on landholding size

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Marginal (less than 0.12.5 acres) Small (2.65.0 acres) Semi-medium (5.1 10 acres) Medium (10.125 acres) Large (25.150 acres) Total farmers

443 296

2 14

0 3

3 52

3 456

71

52

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attend such events because company campaigns and advertisements lead them to believe that each new seed is somewhat technically improved and gives better yields than the existing ones. Moreover, since the farmers have been thoroughly vexed with the negative externalities of non-Bt cotton varieties, they look forward to any new seed that could diminish their vulnerability. As one farmer mentioned, we have no alternative but to adopt the new seed because non-Bt cotton cultivation has created a very fragile economic condition, and a life and death situation. In fact, this desperate situation of the farmers provides companies with an added advantage in the spread of GM seed. Welltrained campaigners with their effective communication skills always try to give a good rst impression of GM crops and present these new seed as the panacea.

Field demonstrations and the social construction of GM crops

Field demonstrations are one of the most inuential marketing strategies in new seed promotion. Seed companies or their agents rst select suitable villages for eld demonstration, then select suitable farmers who are willing to plant GM crops in their elds. Companies usually select demonstration elds in villages that are along the main road for good visibility, and make the task of mobilising farmers easy. Furthermore, companies give preference to villages where farmers have already been cultivating commercial crops such as cotton, chilli and tobacco rather than villages growing noncommercial crops such as food for household consumption, because it is easier to make farmers in those villages understand the economic advantages of the new seed. The seed companies select one or two resourceful farmers in about 10 villages, farmers with adequate resources such as suitable land, an abundant supply of water, implements, basic formal education, ready access to public institutions and previous experience with commercial crops. They also tend to choose farmers from powerful socioeconomic groups (that is, from the upper castes and upper classes). Since Kadavendi was already a predominantly cotton-cultivating village, the agricultural land of a large farmer belonging to an upper caste

(Reddy) was selected for the eld demonstration. Once the farmers have been selected the seed companies provide them with free seed and sometimes even fertilisers and pesticides. They then closely monitor the entire production process, suggesting new risk management techniques to get higher yields. Under such favourable conditions, Bt cotton in the demonstration elds gave higher yields than non-Bt cotton. The farmer who owned the demonstration eld in Kadavendi reported that he had produced 10 quintals of Bt cotton per acre with just four sprays of pesticide (compared to 68 quintals of cotton with 1015 sprays on a more traditional cotton farm). The seed company agents select the best elds for demonstration in order to ensure the proper assessment of the growth of crops and the agronomic value of the produce. This is because the seed companies want to demonstrate in the model elds how the new seed will increase productivity and decrease production costs (by decreasing the number of sprays of pesticide). The local seed company agents then organise 1015 relatively well-off farmers in a group from nearby villages and bring them in a jeep or van to the demonstration site to explain how the new seed could benet them. For the farmers, simply being selected for the eld tours is a source of social prestige. They are considered gentlemen farmers and become agents of information dissemination in the village. During the eld tours the seed agents also arrange for the farmers to interact with the owner of the demonstration eld. This is because it is more effective if the farmer of a successful crop, rather than a company agent, talks about the advantages of the new seed. In many interesting sociological ways, eld demonstrations not only serve to spread GM crops, but also work for consensus building in the farm community, and towards the social construction of the image of GM crops and scientic knowledge about them. Also, eld demonstrations have been used as a means of social learning, a process by which farmers come to know about the benets of GM crops and spread the word in their social networks. In a nutshell, the main purpose of eld demonstrations is social construction of the belief that embracing GM crops is a rational act.

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Farmers advocacy and the exploitation of social networks

As the adoption of GM cotton has accelerated, a few demonstration eld farmers as well as other rich farmers have taken up the seed business in the village. These farmer-cum-informal seed dealers have become the front-end sellers for GM seed companies as well as resource persons for novice Bt cotton farmers. When I asked a local seed dealer about his side business, he said: I do not make much money out of this sidebusiness. I hardly get 10 to 15 rupees commission per bag or free seed for my farm from the companys seed distributors. The seed merchants in town get real prots, not us. It is uncertain whether they make much money or not, but what is very obvious in Kadavendi is that the farmers place more trust in the local farmer-cum-informal-seed dealer than in the local seed merchants. Farmers are familiar with the attitudes of seed merchants and in recent years have found them unreliable. Another important factor that inuences farmers to buy the seed from the local seed dealer is their proximity to their eld, which enhances small and marginal farmers access to the new technology and decreases their transportation costs. The caste system also inuences farmers. Though there are several farmer-cum-informal-seed dealers belonging to various castes, the farmers prefer to go to the seed dealer of their own caste because they place high trust in them and there is a stronger socioeconomic bond between them.

Seed merchantfarmer networks

By the early 1990s hybrid cotton seed spread throughout Warangal district, and farmers overwhelmingly planted cotton because of attractive prices, the government advocacy of export-oriented cash crops and trade liberalisation polices (Stone 2007, p.74). But, as political economist Keith Grifn once asserted (1979, p.212), the spread of hybrids has created a commercial revolution in the countryside by making both agricultural inputs (such as land, labour and technology) and outputs into essential commodities. This process of commodication has increased farmers dependency on the market for agricultural inputs and has also promoted production exclusively for the market.

Taking advantage of the capital-intensive agricultural system and the market-dependent farming community in the district, some erstwhile landlords and rich farmers have invested a part of their accumulated capital, or the money they earned from selling their land, in the agricultural input business. They consider entering the seed business a rational choice because it is very lucrative. Moreover, selling off lands in the countryside and moving into town is considered safer. This is because the Maoist revolutionary movement (the main political programmes of which revolve around the socioeconomic issues of agrarian transformations and the Land-to-the-Tiller slogan), has been growing and is an inuential political force in the region. This process of landlords and rich farmers venturing into business enterprises started in the mid-1980s and gained momentum in the 1990s. It still continues today. Erstwhile big farmers are well established in the agricultural input business because they used their sociocultural, economic and political networks in the villages. Though most of them live in towns, they still exercise signicant socioeconomic and political power over the peasant farmers in the countryside, through their agent networks in villages. Moreover, the commodication of the means of production increases the need for cash, which pushes the small and marginal farmers, lacking access to formal and reliable institutional credit facilities, towards usurious local moneylenders for cash credit, or to seed merchants and dealers for input credit. The advancement of input credit allows seed merchants to sell inputs to the peasant farmers at a higher price and to charge higher interest rates on their input loan because farmers usually pay off their loans, completely or partially, only after selling their produce in the market. In Warangal district there are about a thousand agricultural input merchants, and their social networks cover almost all 1,015 Gram panchayats (village councils). These seed merchantfarmer networks and the semi-feudal relations of production serve as market channels to help the seed companies spread the new seed. This informal nexus between the semi-feudal class and the capitalist class helps us to understand how the locally dominant agrarian classes assist the penetration of global capital as well as global agricultural knowledge.

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Adoption of Bt cotton and the creation of knowledge dependency

Critics have argued that GM crops can generate negative socio-ecological externalities if farmers do not understand and follow specic cropping practices such as the refuge strategy. For this reason, it is crucial to ask whether the farmers receive correct information about the new seed and the specic insect resistance management practices and whether they properly understand the information and follow it. As with any other crop, insects that are exposed to Bt crops will eventually develop resistance to the poisonous substance, Bt toxin, that the crop produces. Considering this, a proactive insect resistance management system was put together by seed companies to delay or prevent the development of Bt resistance in insects. The resistance management plan suggests a refuge strategy of planting non-Bt cotton in at least ve rows surrounding the Bt cotton eld, or 20 per cent of the total sown area, whichever is greater. The logic is that when non-Bt cotton is planted within or around a Bt cotton eld, the non-Bt cotton acts as a refuge for Bt-susceptible insects that will mate with Bt-resistant insects, and produce Bt-susceptible offspring, thereby minimising or delaying the development of Bt-resistant insects. In India, and in other countries where Bt crops have been adopted, it is mandatory to practice the refuge strategy to mitigate as yet unknown socio-ecological and economic risks with the development of Bt resistant insects (Manjunath 2005). All Bt cotton companies sell seed packages with two packets: a 450-gram packet of Bt cotton and a 120-gram packet of non-Bt cotton for the refuge. However, there is considerable doubt whether the implementation of the refuge strategy is feasible in India, where most agricultural producers are marginal and small farmers, and whether these farmers understand the importance of this unique practice. When asked about the practice of the refuge strategy, no farmer in Kadavendi responded positively. In the rst year of adoption of Bt cotton, most of the farmers practiced a refuge strategy according to instructions given by seed merchants; but few practiced it in the second year and from the third year onwards almost all

farmers had abandoned it completely. One farmer explains how he adopted the refuge strategy and why he abandoned it so quickly:
When I purchased Bt cotton seed, the seed merchant advised me to plant non-Bt cotton seed if I could. He told me that non-Bt would work as a border against insects entering into the Bt eld. In the rst year I followed the merchants advice, but from the second year onwards I did not, because I do not see any specic benet with this practice. What we have clearly noticed in the rst year was that insects attacked only non-Bt plants but not Bt plants, and about 200300 non-Bt plants per acre were totally damaged. We were afraid that these insects would also attack Bt cotton plants if we continued to grow non-Bt around it. Thus we stopped using non-Bt around Bt. Moreover, we found this new practice was merely a waste of land, as non-Bt cotton plants do not yield anything. A few farmers, those who mechanically follow the advice of companies, are still planting non-Bt cotton around the Bt cotton eld, but those who do agriculture technically and creatively have stopped practicing this system.(Interview with a Bt cotton farmer in Kadavendi)

Many farmers believe that the seed merchants advised them to plant non-Bt cotton around Bt cotton because they wanted the farmers to compare how effective the new seed can be in increasing productivity and decreasing pest problems. The farmers who do not care about comparing their Bt crop with non-Bt gave all non-Bt seed packets to their relatives or neighbours who cannot afford to buy cotton seed. Furthermore, some farmers just ignored the advice of merchants because they heard their neighbours and other farmers in the village complain that planting non-Bt seed around Bt eld provides no special benet. Though the farmers may ignore the advice of merchants on risk management plans, they remain totally dependent on them for other information regarding seed varieties and pesticide application. If farmers nd a pest on their crop, they will go and describe the problem to the merchant in town, or to local seed dealer, sometimes bringing the infested leaves, fallen owers and bolls and even insects. The dealer or merchant will then give them a pesticide based on his understanding and knowledge or whichever brand gives him a higher prot margin. Sometimes farmers ask the merchant to give them a pesticide similar to the one that he gave to one of his neighbours. Since they do not have any other source of information, they believe the

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merchants and apply pesticides indiscriminately. Admittedly, a farmer says:

We spray whatever the pesticide merchant recommends to us. Though his recommendations do not work effectively all the time, we have to believe him blindly because we have no other source of information. He is like a God to us as our fate is in his hands since he sells us seed as well as chemicals [mandulu].

dependent on scientic knowledge and has lost the ability to experiment and adapt is created. Apart from farmer deskilling, the new technology has also created new agents of local power, domination and governance the agricultural input merchants in the place of former feudal landlords.

In every seed packet the seed companies do provide an information leaet describing the characteristics of GM cotton. But few farmers can read or understand the information on the leaets. In Kadavendi about 65 per cent of the farmers are illiterate. The rest of them are able to read basic information but have never been exposed to information leaets. Thus, the information leaets are merely symbolic. In addition, public extension services are underfunded and inadequate. In Devaruppala mandal, there are only one agricultural ofcer and two agricultural extension ofcers, who are supposed to provide services to 7,664 farmers in 13 villages. Moreover, even the local agricultural ofcers do not have a clear understanding of GM seed. In fact, the local agricultural ofcers work as if Bt cotton does not come under their purview of extension support. This is because of the predominance of private companies in Bt cotton seed research, development and marketing, leaving little for public agricultural researchers and extension workers to do. Given this inefcient public extension system, the local seed and pesticide dealers have become the main sources of information. They inuence the farmers on what seed to sow and what fertilisers and pesticides to apply. Indeed, the general knowledge of dealers about the new seed and insect ecology has become a determining factor regarding crops. A farmer laments:
In the past, we used to do agriculture based on our own knowledge [sontha thelivi] and understanding of nature. But now we do agriculture based on knowledge and suggestions of the seed and pesticide merchants, because we do not know how the new seed works. Moreover, we cannot make experiments with these new seed using our knowledge, because we are not in a position to bear the cost if something goes wrong.

Subjugation of subaltern knowledge and nature

The adoption of these new agricultural technologies and consequent changes in the social organisation of production have greatly inuenced the way the peasant farmer in Kadavendi interacts with, values, and understands nature. Before the introduction of modern technologies, farmers used to maintain a sustainable relationship with nature, and their economic and sociocultural activities were deeply embedded in it. In particular, the primary agricultural producers belonging to Dalitbahujan (an umbrella social category that includes so-called untouchable and backward castes) and Adivasi (tribal) social groups see themselves as an integral part of nature as it plays a predominant role in their everyday sociocultural, religious and economic life. Completely dependent on nature for everyday survival, farmers used to consider it as a mother who nurtures her children with love and care, or as a goddess who blesses her worshipers. Furthermore, farmers position themselves as the responsible sons and daughters of the soil (bhumiputrudu and bhumiputrika), who consciously protect it out of reverence. When farmers were totally dependent on local seed they had more control over their agriculture because their participation in the market was limited and their primary purpose of production was subsistence rather than accumulation. Indeed, the farmers never had a narrow productivistic conception of agriculture in which agriculture is seen as a purely economic activity. Rather, they had a broader ecological view that focused not only on the immediate needs of human beings but also on the sustainability of such things as the quality of the soil and of bodies of water, biodiversity, sociocultural wellbeing and agricultural animals. This ecological thinking was part of their everyday life and was continuously reproduced through various

In the process of agricultural deskilling, rstly, farmers knowledge and skills are made obsolete, and then, a farming community that is

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sociocultural forms to be passed along from one generation to another. Seed is the heart of agriculture. It is often considered as a storehouse of culture and history (Shiva 2001). Thus, seed saving was one of the core activities of farmers in India, involving four vital activities: rstly, the identication, separation and collection of good quality produce from the harvest for reuse as seed in the next season; secondly, properly cleaning the seed before preserving them in earthen pots; thirdly, checking them regularly and properly sun-drying them on the oor at appropriate intervals (usually once a month or so) to avoid infections and to kill insects if any had entered into the seed storage pots and fourthly, cleaning them well again before the sowing season starts. All these activities were carried out by women who possessed special knowledge and skills for selecting, collecting and preserving good quality seed. Except for the collection of seed, all other seed activities would take place in the domestic sphere of production, where women remain responsible for activities such as cleaning, nurturing and cooking. When asking farmers how and why women possessed special knowledge about seed, the most common response was that protecting seed was an important female responsibility because it consisted of female activities such as cleaning and caring. Moreover, men were always busy with other on-farm activities (such as ploughing, land development and watering crops) as well as offfarm ones, such as going to the market. Thus, the patriarchal relations of production reproduced the gendered division of labour in household and agricultural activities. But the interesting point to note is that the gender division is not just of labour but also of local knowledge. Hence, women possessed the multigenerational knowledge of seed, which provided them with intra-household bargaining power and social recognition as custodians and providers of local seed. Since the introduction of hybrid seed that produce less productive or sterile seed, and the rise of production for the market, farmers tend to buy the seed from the market for every season. With the commodication of seed, womens role as the protector of seed has diminished and their knowledge about seed has become obsolete. When asked about the changing role of women as seed developers, a male cotton farmer explained:

When we were using the seed from our elds, women had more knowledge about the old seed than men because they were responsible for collection and preservation of good quality seed. But now we have stopped saving seed from our elds because we are no longer using them. If we notice anybody in our village getting a good crop, we go and enquire about the seed that the farmer has used and the place of purchase; then we go and buy the same seed from the market. Since we started buying the new seed from the market, men have more knowledge about seed, because they are the only ones who go to the market and discuss with the seed merchants and other farmers about the performance of the new seed and buy them.(Interview with a Bt cotton farmer in Kadavendi)

This farmers explanation shows how women possessed special knowledge and power when the farmers were using the old seed collected from the eld; but since the introduction of the new seed womens knowledge has been devalued and dispossessed. In fact, the new seed from the market have enhanced opportunities for men to participate in the agricultural input as well as its output, and have reinforced
Table 3: Crops that are disappearing and have disappeared in Kadavendi within the last 20 years English name Cereals and millets Pearl millet Foxtail millet Sorghum Finger millet Maize Proso miller Rice varieties Oil seeds Castor Safower Sunower Sesame Groundnut Pulses Soybean Greengram Horsegram Cowpea Field bean Blackgram Redgram Other Tobacco Source: Field research Telugu name Sajjalu Korralu Jonnalu/pacha jonnalu Taidalu/ragulu Mokka jonna Varigalu Sambalu Bankodlu Palasannalu Pottimolakalu Amdalu Kusumalu Podduthirugudu Nuvvulu Pallikaya/verushanaga Soyabean Pesarlu Ulavalu Bebbarlu Anumulu Minumulu Kandulu Pogaku

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patriarchal power relations in households in general, together with the male domination of decision-making throughout the agricultural production process. Indeed, this lends some support to the construction of a simple binary opposition between matriarchal nature and the patriarchal market. In the process of production for the market, farmers totally neglected cultivating many staple food and oil crops, which have eventually disappeared from the rural landscape. In Kadavendi several varieties of crops mentioned in Table 3 have totally disappeared within the last 20 years and crops such as sesame (nuvvulu), groundnut (pallikaya) and redgram (kandulu) are on the verge of disappearing. This is not just an erosion of biodiversity, but the dispossession of farmers control over agriculture, livelihood, food security and the local knowledge and cultural values associated with these crops.

Conclusion
My research ndings demonstrate that social and cultural factors are crucial in the adoption

of GM seed: that issues such as trust and caste allegiance play a part, that aggressive marketing strategies such as demonstration plots are not simply neutral experiments in the eld but are interwoven with power relations and social relations, which thereby reinforce inequities in the rural society. Furthermore, the unintended consequences of the adoption of new seed are cruel the narrowing of foodstuffs produced, the loss of local knowledge, the further social devaluing of women and the reinforcement of patriarchy and the market. Anthropologist James Scott argues, and I agree, that agricultural technological innovations based on imperial scientic views are not just strategies of production, but also strategies of control and appropriation (Scott 1998, p.311, emphasis added). Thus, my work suggests that a true study of the gene revolution requires eldwork with sensitivity to local class and status, gender and cultural issues, and to ways in which farmers technology adoption decisions can dramatically alter the overall quality of life, local knowledge systems, community development, the sustainability of agriculture and, ultimately, the survival of the ecosystem itself.

Note
1. I wish to express my sincere thanks to Kishore Karanam, Narsihma Guvvala, Anjaiah Bashipaka, and Srinivasulu Panneeru for their great help during my eld research. I also want to thank the farmers of Kadavendi village for their gracious cooperation. My special thanks to Professor Michael Gismondi at Athabasca University and Professor Gordon Laxer at the University of Alberta for discussions and helpful comments and suggestions. This research was funded by the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada, and the Department of Sociology, University of Alberta. I thank them for their support. I also wish to express my gratitude to the Killam Trusts for awarding me the Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Scholarship (2006 2008).

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