To complement their announcment today (18.1.07) of a 13% increase in the global area planted to GM crops in 2006 (see http://www.cropgen.org/article_107.html), ISAAA has provided the following breakdown by country:

• United States: 54.6 million hectares. The United States continued to grow more biotech crops than any other country with a gain of 4.8 million hectares in 2006, compared to 2.2 million in 2005. This was the largest absolute area growth of all countries in 2006 and was greater than recent years. The increase was a result of significant area gains in biotech maize, which increased about 15 percent.

• Argentina: 18 million hectares. Argentina accounted for 18 percent of the global biotech crop area, increasing hectarage 5 percent or 0.9 million hectares. Biotech soybean, maize and cotton plantings all experienced increases.

• Brazil: 11.5 million hectares. Brazil experienced 22 percent growth in biotech crop area, mainly in herbicide-tolerant soybean area, while planting 120,000 hectares of insect-resistant biotech cotton commercially for the first time.

• Canada: 6.1 million hectares. One of the original “founders” of biotech crops, Canada’s biotech crop area grew 5 percent in 2006, due to increases in canola, maize and soybean plantings.

• India: 3.8 million hectares. India posted the highest percentage growth in 2006 at 192 percent, or 2.5 million hectares. Biotech cotton area nearly tripled, exceeding China’s biotech cotton area for the first time.

• China: 3.5 million hectares. China increased its Bt cotton crop from 3.3 to 3.5 million hectares in 2006, a growth rate of 6 percent.

• Paraguay: 2 million hectares. Paraguay increased its biotech soybean area another 10 percent in 2006, to account for 90 percent of the country’s total soybean crop.

• South Africa: 1.4 million hectares. South Africa nearly tripled its biotech plantings in 2006, up from 0.5 million hectares in 2005. Insect-resistant white maize used for food and yellow maize used for feed accounted for the growth. Forty-four percent of the country’s white maize and 50 percent of the yellow maize were planted to biotech varieties.

• Uruguay: 400,000 hectares. Uruguay again increased its biotech crop area in 2006, growing more than 350,000 hectares of biotech soybean and more than 35,000 hectares of biotech maize.

• Philippines: 200,000 hectares. The Philippines increased its biotech maize area by more than 100 percent, up from 70,000 hectares last year.

• Australia: 200,000 hectares. Australia, one of the founder biotech crop countries, is seeing declining cotton area due to continued severe drought. About 90 percent of the country’s crop is planted to biotech varieties.

• Romania: 115,000 hectares. Nearly 80 percent of Romania’s soybean crop was planted to herbicide-tolerant varieties in 2006. Despite the country’s positive experiences with the crop in the past eight years, the Romanian Government has decided to discontinue cultivation of biotech soybean upon joining the EU in January 2007.

• Mexico: 60,000 hectares. Due to regulatory issues that delayed importing of biotech cottonseed for the first planting, Mexico’s production of insect-resistant cotton dropped a third to 55,000 hectares in 2006 when it also grew about 5,000 hectares of biotech soybean.

• Spain: 60,000 hectares. Unofficial estimates indicate Spain’s biotech maize hectarage in 2006 grew to approximately 15 percent of the total maize plantings of 370,000 hectares, up from about 12 percent in 2005. Spain continues to lead the EU in planting biotech crops.

• Colombia: 30,000 hectares. Colombia continued its steady increase of insect-resistant cotton planting to account for about 40 percent of the total crop. Colombia also planted its first crop of herbicide-tolerant cotton in 2006 on approximately 1,000 hectares.

• France: 5,000 hectares. In its second year of biotech plantings after a four-year gap, France experienced a five- to ten-fold increase in insect-resistant maize area in 2006, versus 500 to 1,000 hectares in 2005. Biotech maize has gained strong support among the country’s farmers, who stand to gain more from the crop than any other EU country.

• Iran: 4,000 hectares. While no formal estimates are available for biotech rice production in Iran, unofficial estimates suggest that the planted area will be at least equivalent to the 4,000 hectares planted in 2005.

• Honduras: 2,000 hectares. Honduras continued increasing its area of insect-resistant maize, reaching 1,000 hectares in 2006, while planting 1,000 hectares of herbicide-tolerant maize for the first time.

• Czech Republic (Czechia): 1,290 hectares. The fifth EU country to grow biotech crops experienced a ten-fold increase in Bt maize production in its second year of planting.

• Portugal: 1,250 hectares. In it’s second year of planting after a four-year gap, Portugal nearly doubled its area of Bt maize production in 2006.

• Germany: 950 hectares. While Germany plants a modest area of Bt maize, the hectarage has nearly tripled from the 350 hectares it has typically grown in the past six years.

• Slovakia: 30 hectares. The newest country to plant biotech crops, Slovakia grew a modest area of Bt maize in its first year of commercial planting. Slovakia became the sixth country in the EU to plant biotech crops.

Source: International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (18.1.07) (http://www.isaaa.org)

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