Conflicting results in ag-biotech survey for women farmers

The passionate seem more driven to act, but how much can they skew the reality of the situation? In this case, quite a lot, it appears.

I was recently involved in running workshops for a small number of Australia’s women farmers (with one or two blokes on occasion) on biotechnology in agriculture. Workshop participants did some kitchen chemistry and explored the technologies used to develop novel crops, with specific focus on the GM (transgenic) technologies.

Each participant completed a pre- and post-workshop evaluation that rated the quality of the actual workshop and also delved into participants’ thoughts about the acceptability or otherwise of GM crops in Australia’s agricultural systems. We made the latter part of the survey available online for those unable to come to the workshops.  The difference in survey results between the workshop participants and those that did the survey online is striking; striking enough to question whether the results are reflective of real farmer attitudes toward GM technologies.

It definitely has nothing to do with the content of the workshop as this part of the survey was completed before the workshop started. As alluded to already, I suspect a strong passion toward a topic drives one to act.  Less passion; less action. See below for a deeper analysis of the data.

A summary of the workshops and evaluation can be found in the latest Molecular Plant Breeding CRC newsletter. The complete workshop report was sent to all key groups that participated in the workshops, but TechNyou has a copy it can send to anyone who wants it.

Conflicting results

Overview

Women attending the workshops were given the survey to complete, at the beginning of the session. No information on biotechnology was given prior to the surveys being collected to avoid bias. This means that both the online respondents and workshop attendees had the same amount and type of information available to them prior to completing the survey.

A total of 134 women farmers completed the survey. Of these, 59 completed the survey online, and 75 participated in workshops.  Of course, we have no way of telling if the people who did the online survey were women, but we’ll assume they were.

Online surveys

There are stark differences between the results of the workshop participants and the online respondents. The following extracts from the report will give you the general idea:

55% of online respondents rated themselves as having high or very high understanding of GM technologies. 69% associated a high or very high level of risk with their use and this was closely linked with 70% of respondents indicating the level of benefit they associated with use to be very low or low.

In contrast, only 21% of workshop attendees self-rated their understanding of GM technologies as high, with the 41% majority indicating they would rate their understanding as very low or low.  49% of workshop respondents indicated they associated a very low or low level of risk with use, and 68% rated the level of benefit associated with use as high or very high.

Respondents were asked to rate whether they agreed with a series of statements about GM technology. 52% of online responses indicated they strongly agreed with the statement “Plants and animals should only be changed through traditional breeding methods, not GM”, compared with only 9% of workshop attendees.

This ties with the over 60% of online respondents who indicated that they strongly disagreed with the statement “we should accept some risk from GM technologies if it enhances Australia’s economic competitiveness”, compared with 15% of workshop attendees.

Why is there such vast discrepancies between the two groups and what conclusions can we draw, if any, about farmer attitudes toward transgenic technologies?

One more table of figures made me go back to the raw data and dig a bit deeper. The table below show big differences in the primary crops grown by the online participants and the workshoppers, namely fruit/vegetables, pasture, wheat and barley.

Who are the onliners

Specifically, I wanted to know who were the farmers growing fruit/vegetables and pasture.

This following information is from the sample of 32 farmers that completed the survey online in the final two weeks before the survey closed. So it ain’t the full picture, but the report’s author said it is a fairly complete list regards the farmers who listed fruit/vege or pasture as their primary crop.

Of these 32 farmers, 27 rated the risk associated with the use of GM technologies as high or very high (nearly all rated it as very high).  As expected the same group said the benefits associated with GM technologies were very low; that plants and animals should only be changed through traditional breeding techniques; and they strongly disagreed with the notion that we should accept some risk with GM technologies.  Twenty-four of these 27 farmers grew fruits/vegetables or had pasture as a primary crop linked to cattle, dairy or sheep. Of these, 14 identified their information sources about GM technologies coming from anti-GM groups (MADGE, Network for Concerned Farmers, Genethics), or from organic/biological farming organisations or groups (Biodynamic Research Institute, Biological Farmers Association, and groups linked to organic dairy farmers and organic/biodynamic food and farming groups). The Soil Food Web Institute was also mentioned, though this isn’t an anti-GM group but its research is important for the biological farming industry.

In contrast, of the five farmers that thought the opposite to the above 27, three were strictly cereal farmers (wheat, barley, canola, lupins), one had a cherry orchard, the other was a beef cattle farmer.

The 27 definitively opposed to anything associated with GM technologies had common themes in their reasons for this stance that included many references to the destruction of the organics industry; a lack of independent testing/research; that GM technologies were unnatural; unknown long-term health risks; lying/cheating/greedy big industry running the show…and so on.

A piece of their mind

If nothing else this group was passionate. Some of their comments below to the following questions say it best, though all 27 gave comments with similar sentiments:

• Do you think GM technology could benefit your industry? In what ways?
• What do you see as potential barriers to your use of GM technologies? How do you think these issues could be addressed?
• What suggestions do you have for the future direction of GM technology research in Australia?

I haven’t bothered to correct grammar/spelling, but I am sure you get the picture.

“By being honest and reveal that the tests show otherwise. corrupt scientists especially now after this climatgate scientists are a joke now.”

“They are artificial and designed to make money, not to improve essential quality.”

“I see GM as a dangerous and insidious infiltration of conventional and traditional seed varieties only for the benefits of chemical companies”

“IT IS AGAINST OUR NATURAL HEALTH”

“No truth, no independent testing, what company sells a product knowing it is lying to the consumer”

“No. It will destroy existing farming(conventional and organic) businesses by the lack of regulation to protect our right to farm without having to pay some multicorporation their licensing fees for seed that they have no right to claim as theirs. Also they are damaging the world with their round up ready chemicals that are dangerous to us and to all flora and fauna. Monopolies create these problems. Diversity has been eroded.”

“Matter of principle using something unnatural and dangerous”

“Take your product back to where it came from. We don’t need it here.”

“Stop wasting government money on multinational shareholders who are the only ones benefitting from this rubbish.”

The other five farmers were somewhat reserved by comparison. Certainly, any passion was hard to detect in their judgment of GM technologies. Generally they suggested GM technologies have a place in agriculture depending on how it is used.  Drought, frost and salinity tolerance were high on their list of traits they thought acceptable for GM technologies to help solve.

My conclusions

I doubt if the online survey results are representative of the general farming community, if for no other reason that it is out of sync with pretty much every other similar survey of farmer attitudes to this technology. The caveat, of course, is that this is a small survey and hardly random, so regardless of the results they need to be treated with caution.

From the above data, however, it appears that a passionate few closely linked to the organics or biological farming community or simply totally opposed to the technology have found out about the survey and rushed to tell a few like-minded friends about it and consequently skewed the data. There is nothing wrong with this, nor is there anything wrong with the views this group express.  But, assuming my assumptions are remotely correct, it makes it difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from the data. What it might indicate is that organic farmers or those opposed to GM technologies are driven, passionate and consequently act on those passions. In contrast those not completely opposed or cautious about GM technologies (which in most surveys are the majority) are, for whatever reasons, less inclined to act or fuss or get on their soapbox and voice opposition – or fill out online surveys.

Workshop rationale

Women farmers are strong decision-makers on the farm, yet when it comes to workshops and committees, they are under-represented. Recognising this, the Molecular Plant Breeding Cooperative Research Centre (MPBCRC) earlier this year held a series of workshops focused on recognising the role of women farmers in decision making. TechNyou tagged along to help by facilitating an interactive exercise exploring the ethics of GM technologies.

The workshops were part of a grant from the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry through its Farming Future initiative. The workshops were free for participants. Part of the funding involved undertaking a survey of women farmers on their attitudes towards biotechnology and their perceived barriers to the uptake of such technologies.

The workshops were overall poorly attended and there are probably many reasons for this, but we have since had a few requests from farmer groups to run similar workshops specifically for them.

All survey participants indicated that they would like more information and education about the technologies.  In particular, there was a high interest in drought tolerant varieties and potential solutions to this problem.

Women who attended the workshops were positive about the use of workshops such as these to increase involvement in decision making, with comments including the following:

• “More of this sort of independent information sessions and open forums”
• “Offer sessions like these.

So stay tuned

Jason

TechNyou