Sustainable agriculture and GM crops: the case of Bt cotton impact in Ballari district of India

Effects of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton are at the forefront of an intense debate on the benefits of genetically modified (GM) crops among smallholder farmers in developing countries. Existing studies fail to control for confounders, selection bias, or cultivation bias from preferential treatment in the initial adoption phase. Addressing these concerns in this paper, I examine the impact of Bt cotton employing an unbalanced panel fixed-effects model of a crop yield and profit function on newly collected plot-level data in the most recent decade. Results show that Bt cotton yields have stagnated, have a null effect on profits, and have become more sensitive to pest pressure in the most recent decade. Though many studies have demonstrated higher crop yield and profit gains in the first decade of Bt cotton adoption that raised the average returns to the technology, the second decade shows convergence in benefits, which raises obvious questions about the prospect of GM technology. Since Bt cotton is the only GM crop technology widely adopted by smallholder farmers, the findings of this paper contribute to the broader public debate on the future of agricultural biotechnology.