Potential welfare benefits from the public-private partnerships: A case of genetically engineered eggplant in India

Journal of Food, Agriculture and Environment

Volumn 6, Issue 3-4, 2008, Pages 333-340

  Kolady, Deepthi Elizabeth ^a   Lesser, William ^a  

^a Cornell University ^*  (United States)

Author keywords

Eggplant; Genetically engineered; India; Public private partnership; Welfare benefits

Indexed keywords

SOLANUM MELONGENA;

EID: 55249104535     PISSN: 14590255     EISSN: 14590263     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (30)

1. Byerlee, D. and Fischer, K. 2002. Accessing modern science: Policy and institutional options for agricultural biotechnology in developing countries. World Development 30:931-948.
2. Hareau, G. G., Mills, B. F. and Norton, G. W. 2006. The potential benefits of herbicide-resistant transgenic rice in Uruguay: Lessons for small developing countries. Food Policy 31:162-179.
3. Dhandapani, N., Shelkar, U. R. and Murugan, M. 2003. Bio-intensive pest management in major vegetable crops: An Indian perspective. J. Food, Agri. & Environ. 1(2):330-339.
4. The public-private partnership (P-P) involves Mahyco (developer of Bt hybrid eggplant) and public institutions such as Tamil Nadu Agricultural University. This P-P arrangement was facilitated by Agricultural Biotechnology Project II (http://www.absp2.cornell.edu/)
5. Kataria, A. S. 2005. Development of F1 hybrid in vegetable crops and the availability in public and private sector. 2005 from http://www. seedassociationofindia.com.paperbysai.asp
6. Kolady, D. and Lesser, W. 2006. Who adopts what kind of technologies? The case of Bt eggplant. AgBioForum 9:94-103
7. Krishna, V. and Qaim, M. 2007. Estimating the adoption of Bt eggplant in India: Who benefits from public-private partnership? Food Policy 32:523-543.
8. Alston, J. M., Norton, G. W. and Pardey, P. G. 1995. Science Under Scarcity: Principles and Practice for Agricultural Research Evaluation and Priority Setting. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY.
9. Moschini, G. and Lapan, H. 1997. Intellectual property rights and the welfare effects of agricultural R&D. Am. J. Agri. Econ. 79:1229-1242.
10. Falck-Zepeda, J. B., Traxler, G. and Nelson, R. G. 2000. Rent creation and distribution from biotechnology innovations: The case of Bt cotton and herbicide-tolerant soybeans in 1997. Agribusiness 16:21-32.
11. In our survey, for the WTP question for Bt hybrid, the first bid offered was Rs 400/10 g packet. If the response was "no" from the farmer, a lower bid was offered. The lower bids offered were: Rs 350, Rs 300, Rs 250, Rs 200, and Rs 150 each for a 10 g packet. The bid ranges were chosen to cover what we perceived to be a likely range of retail prices, and WTP for Bt hybrid seeds. During the pre-testing of the survey, we identified farmers' difficulties in responding to a double-bounded CV framework for Bt OPV. This may be due to the fact that OPV seeds are marketed at a cheaper price and that farmers do not replace seeds of open pollinated varieties annually. Hence, an open-ended CV format where farmers were requested to state their WTP for Bt OPV eggplant was used. During the survey the market price for OPV seeds was Rs 16/50g packet. Note that 1 US $ is equivalent to Rs 40.9 (August, 2007). Because of the small amount values are expressed in Rs.
12. Hubbell, B.J., Marra, M.C. and Carlson, G.A. 2000. Estimating the demand for a new technology: Bt cotton and insecticide policies. Am. J. Agri. Econ. 82:118-132.
13. Wooldridge, J. M. 2002. Econometric analysis of cross section and panel data. MIT Press Cambridge, Mass.
14. The first category of farmers have WTP higher than or equal to Rs 400/10 g packet, second group has WTP higher than second lower bid, but less than Rs 400, and the third group has WTP less than second lower bid. Please see footnote 1 for further details.
15. Since we set 40% as the savings in pesticide expenses due to Bt hybrid in our baseline scenario we set 40% over conventional hybrid seed price as the lowest value of expected Bt hybrid seed price.
16. Kolady, D. and Lesser, W. 2007. Is genetically engineered technology a good alternative to pesticide use? The case of GE eggplant in India (In press, Int. J. of Biotechnology).
17. Based on the results from the field trials, we conservatively selected 40% for the baseline scenario. This is much smaller than what was reported in the questionnaire (70-75%). Since most of the farmers in the sample were familiar with the performance of Bt cotton we do not think that there is any bias in farmers responses, and set 70% as the upper level.
18. Subramaniam, S. R., Vardarajan, S. R. and Asokan, M. 2000. India. In Ali, M. (ed.). Dynamics of Vegetable Production, Distribution, and Consumption in Asia. The World Vegetable Center, AVRDC, Thailand, pp. 99-138.
19. PAY is estimated as the 90% of the best available yield in the research stations and in adaptive trials. The study also reported a yield gap of 36.6 metric tons for eggplant in India.
20. Qaim, M., Subramanian, A., Naik, G. and Zilberman, D. 2006. Adoption of Bt cotton and impact variability: Insights from India. Rev. Agri. Econ. 28:48-58.
21. Bennett, R., Kambhampati, U., Morse, S. and Ismael, Y. 2006. Farm-level economic performance of genetically modified cotton in Maharashtra, India. Rev. Agri. Econ. 28:59-71.
22. Mishra, S. 2003. An Ex-Ante Economic Impact Assessment of Bt Eggplant in Bangladesh, the Philippines and India. Unpublished Master's thesis, Virginia Tech University, USA.
23. The large number of OP V varieties grown by farmers creates the demand for developing multiple Bt OPVs meeting diversified requirements. However, the financial constraints of the public sector may limit the number of Bt OPV varieties developed and thus the adoption rate of Bt OPVs. Hence, our estimate of 10% may not be very low in the Indian context. 23 Since two of the previous studies focused on rural/urban consumers only, we selected -0.56 for the baseline scenario.
24. Srinivasan, R. 1987. A Study on Nutritional Status of Rural Households in Madurai District. Department of Agricultural Economics, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Madurai, India.
25. Nagarajan, 1994. Changing Structure of Demand for Agricultural Products in Tami Nadu (Research Report). Tata Economic Consultancy Services, Chennai, India.
26. Since two of the previous studies focused on rural/urban consumers only, we selected -0.56 for the baseline scenario.
27. 2.
28. To reduce the number of tables, results from the sensitivity analysis of some parameters such as price elasticity of demand, price elasticity of supply, yield change, savings in pesticide expenses are not reported here.
29. Most of the small farmers in India grow more than one crop. Hence collecting information specific to eggplant is difficult in the Indian context.
30. Bt cotton is not patented in India, however each Bt hybrid has to be approved by Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) in India. Mahyco used the Bt construct licensed from Monsanto in its Bt cotton varieties, and later sub-licensed the technology to selected seed companies in India. Thus Mahyco enjoyed monopoly power in the Bt seed market (charges price four times the conventional hybrid seed price). However, state government such as Andhra Pradesh in India intervened to reduce the price of Bt cotton seeds. Further, indigenously developed Bt technologies by JK seeds and Nath seeds are now available for Bt cotton seeds.