A new improved GMO cowpea variety developed by CSIR scientists would grow the cowpea sector at an average of about 10% annually over the next six years, analysis of an economic study released this month has revealed.
The study is forecasting the new insect resistant cowpea will add GH₵230mto the cowpea production economy by 2025, if it is commercialised next year.
Scientists at the Savannah Agric Research Institute (SARI), an institute of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) have completed field trials on the new GMO variety know as Bt cowpea.
They are expected to put in an application for commercial release to the National Biosafety Authority, after which it can get into the hands of farmers if approved.
The figure above implies on the average, the new cowpea variety will add about GH₵38m annually to the cowpea production economy which is currently valued at about GH₵415m.
This indicates that all other things being equal, the new variety could help grow the cowpea production sector every year on the average by almost 10 percent (9.15% to be specific) if adopted.
The study, however, predicts if regulatory procedures delay the introduction of the new cowpea for five years, Ghana stands to lose about GH₵152m.
The study conducted jointly by CSIR-Science and Technology Policy Research Institute (STEPRI), Institute of Statistical Social and Economic Research (ISSER) of the University of Ghana, and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) assesses the potential producer and consumer impact of commercializing GMO cowpea and rice based on secondary data and the use of the economic surplus model.
The expected gain will be derived mainly from increased yields associated with protection from insects conferred by the new variety.
When all other considerations including reduction in the number of insecticide applications, the associated labor cost from spraying and other benefits are factored in, the net present value benefit of adopting the new GMO cowpea will hit GH₵578 over the six-year period.
Insect pests remain a major challenge to cowpea production in Ghana and Africa. The maruca pod borer, for example, can destroy up to 80 percent of cowpea fields when it infects farms.
Farmers have to spray fields every week throughout the three-month life span of the cowpea in other to control them, draining their finances and causing damage to their health and the environment.
The new GMO variety was produced by introducing a gene capable of killing the pest into a local cowpea variety, Songotra, making it inherently resistant.
Dr. Mumuni Abdulai who is principal investigator on the Bt cowpea project says field trials that compare the GMO cowpea and traditional one shows the new variety cuts down the use of pesticides by about 75 percent. “With the conventional cowpea, farmers spray about 8 times.
With the new variety, they spray only two times,” he told Joy News. The field trials also show there was a much lower pod damage by the pests (about 28.6 times lower) in the new GMO cowpea than in the traditional variety.
The trials additionally reveal the new variety gives higher yield as a result of reduction in destruction by the pests. Yield output was 0.925 tonnes per hectare for the traditional variety, compared to 1.925 tonnes per hectare for the new GMO variety, an indication yield more than doubled for the latter.