Inside look at Monsanto’s Hawaii farm nursery

by Jenny Dewey Rohrich, April 13, 2015, Prairie Californian

Spring is here and that means pretty soon farmers across the nation will be pulling equipment out of the shed and into the field. Farmers across the nation will be dumping bag after bag of corn seed into their planter without thinking twice about what it took to get that seed to the planter.

The life cycle of the corn we grow here on the farm begins long before it meets the ground on our farm. And that was a perspective I rarely thought about. So what is the life cycle of the corn seed and how does it end up on our farm for us to plant?

It doesn’t matter what type of corn seed you are buying on the farm, almost all seeds are developed in much of the same way. It just so happens that my husband and I got the wonderful opportunity to tour through Monsanto Hawaii while we were enjoying our vacation on Oahu.

It was amazing to know that some of the corn we plant on our farm may have been grown in Hawaii at one point in time!

Monsanto is one of five seed companies operating in Hawaii and for good reason. Once a new trait or technology is developed in a seed, it can take 10 to 12 years before the product can hit the market. By comparison, non-biotech or conventional products can be brought to market in about two-thirds the time.

Having farms in Hawaii helps speed up the process. Monsanto can grow three to four sets of crops in one year’s time compared to one at farms on the mainland. This greatly reduces the time needed to get new seeds to both domestic and worldwide markets.

Read full, original article: The Life of a Seed Before It Hits the Farm