ABSTRACT

The economics of Bollgard cotton on a field scale have been examined by a number of investigators, including Monsanto and independent scientists since 1995, one year before Bollgard's commercial release. Many of these comparisons have been reported in the Proceedings of the Beltwide Cotton Conference. The results demonstrate that growers, on average, realize a significant Bollgard economic advantage, when using Bollgard cotton. These economic advantages are due to a combination of increased yields and decreased insect control costs. The economic advantage of Bollgard over conventional cotton production over the five-year test period (1995-1999) in the independent trials was $49.80. This is consistent with the average advantage ($40.18) calculated for Bollgard from 549 economic comparisons sponsored by Monsanto over the period of 1995 to 2001. Data from Monsanto's 2002 field economic comparison trials (107 sites) gave an average Bollgard advantage of approximately $33.72 per acre. The 2002 Bollgard end-of-season boll damage survey conducted on growers' fields across the cotton belt showed that Bollgard varieties exhibited an average of 1.76% worm damaged bolls compared to 4.60 % for non-Bollgard varieties managed with conventional insecticides.