Title: What you see is news. Press reporting of Bt maize and Bt cotton between 1996 and 2015

Stephen MorseCentre for Environmental Strategy, University of Surrey, Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH, UK

Email: S.Morse@surrey.ac.uk

Abstract

This paper uses the Nexis database to explore the global media reporting of Bt maize and Bt cotton between 1996 and 2015 in terms of trends over time and how this relates to region (North America, Europe and Asia) and topic (six in total) of focus. While Bt cotton and Bt maize are ‘GM’ there are differences between them in terms of the extent and pattern of media reporting. An apparent spike in media reporting of Bt maize between 1998 and 2001 as largely linked to the North America and Europe regions, and covers the period just after the first commercial release of that variety. For Bt cotton the broad trend in media reporting mirrors the increase in Bt cotton area, and a sharp rise in press reporting as of 2008/2009 in Asia follows a rapid increase in the area of Bt cotton in India since that time. For both crops the count of articles classified as ‘Environment and natural resources’ was significantly higher than for the other topics and for both crops the topic ‘Safety, accidents and disasters’ had the lowest count. The media picks up on many signals within the GM crop arena, and may have a significant influence given that the public may rely heavily upon the media for its information regarding GM.

Keywords: crop protection, media, genetic modification, insect resistance

Introduction

Genetically modified (GM) crops were first made commercially available in 1992 when China released a GM tobacco variety. By1996 it has been estimated by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA; www.isaaa.org) that the area planted to GM crop varieties was 27.8 million ha spread across 6 countries although the bulk of the area was planted in the United States. By 2015 ISAAA estimated that this area had increased to 179.7 million ha planted by 28 countries, although just three countries, the USA, Brazil and Argentina combined have the lion’s share of this at 139.6 million ha. Much has been written in both the academic literature and popular press about GM crops and the debates have often been heated. Different sides of the debate quote scientific studies that support, or be interpreted to support, their position. Analyses undertaken by bodies such as the US National Academy of Sciences and Royal Society in the UK which are regarded as favourable towards GM crops are dismissed by critics as being biased. For example the Soil Association in the UK in response to the Royal Society document stated that:

“This Royal Society document about GM crops, like every other one they have issued over the last nearly 20 years, argues in favour of GM. Everyone knows that there are at least some scientific controversies, and disagreements about evidence concerning GM crops. None of these are mentioned in the Royal Society document. This may not be surprising, given that there are no scientists who have consistently expressed scepticism about the application of GM technology to agriculture listed among the authors. Scientific enquiry normally proceeds by open discussion of disagreements about evidence – the Royal Society’s involvement in GM has been consistently one-sided, ignoring scientists with dissenting views, and overlooking facts which do not fit with the views of supporters of GM crops.”(Soil Association; www.soilassociation.org/news/2016/may/soil-association-response-to-gm-plants-questions-and-answers-the-royal-society/; accessed 8th June 2016)

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Issues related to crop protection have often appeared in the media, especially since the development of organic pesticides following the Second World War and the associated environmental problems highlighted by Rachel Carson and others (Kroll, 2001). A more recent example in the EU is the press attention that surrounded the claimed impacts of neonicotinoids on bee populations (Veale et al., 2012). Hence GM crops have certainly not been the only crop protection technology to have attracted media attention. DeRosier et al. (2015) explored the newspaper reporting of GM crops in Kenyan and international newspapers between 2010 and early 2014, especially in the wake of and intense debate which surrounded the retraction of a published paper (Séralini et al., 2012) suggesting ingestion of a GM maize variety resistant to a herbicide called glyphosate caused a number of serious health issues, including cancer, in rats (Arjó et al., 2013). Perhaps understandably in the circumstances DeRosier et al. (2015) found an increased incidence of newspaper reporting centred on risk over that period. Press reporting of these issues matters as it can influence public opinion and in turn this may influence policy makers and politicians; the so-called ‘Agenda Setting’ theory that has long been discussed within the literature on media reporting and influence (McCombs et al., 1997). The role of the media in helping to set agendas may be especially powerful with what are termed ‘unobtrusive issues’ where the public may have little access to other sources of information (Zucker, 1978; Ader, 1993). GM crops may be regarded as such an ‘unobtrusive’ issue in the sense that the majority of the public will have little time or inclination to peruse more technical reporting of the technology. The widespread use by the media of terms such as ‘Frankenfoods’ in the 1990s (the terms first appeared in a letter published in the New York Times on June 16th 1992) has been highly influential on public opinion towards GM crops (Miller and Conke, 2004; Kniazeva 2006; Moses, 2012). As Yaren (2001; page 156) succinctly put it:

“Words like "frankenfoods," "killer weeds," "super bugs," "terminator genes," and "demon seeds" make excellent headlines. Add the statement that Prince Charles and Paul McCartney will not eat genetically modified food because it is unnatural, and you have a story that people are going to read.”

The press may also be influenced by politicians, of course, and indeed may also respond to what are perceived to be the prevalent views amongst its readership. Thus the process is far from being one-way in nature.

While there have been studies of the reporting of GM crops in the media and how this may influence, and be influenced by, public opinion (Moses, 2012, 2015; Marques et al., 2015), there have been few global studies designed to explore patterns in terms of the geography and issues that are covered. Morse (2016) addressed two questions regarding the press reporting of the GM debate:

1. Has the significant increase in GM crop area (and number of countries) since 1996 been paralleled by an increase in press reporting?

2. What issues are discussed in the press reports?

He employed the Nexis database which “aggregates information from over 36,000 international news and business sources, as well as thousands of business-relevant websites, blogs and forums” (Nexis brochure) and with regard to question 2 above the managers of the database to classify articles within topics including:

Environment & Natural Resources Ethics Government & Public Administration Law & Legal System Safety, Accidents & Disasters Society, Social Welfare & Lifestyle Trade & Development

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Results suggested that the relationship between press reporting and GM crop area is a mixed one, with evidence for a positive relationship in Africa, Asia and Latin America but not elsewhere. In terms of topics there is no strong evidence to suggest that some of those expected to be linked to a strong negative stance regarding GM crops are dominant, with the possible exception of ‘Environment and natural resources’. Indeed the pattern suggests reporting that is, if anything, mildly positive towards GM up until 2013. But the search term ‘GM crops’ is a very broad one and in the discussion of the Morse (2016) paper it was noted that an interesting next step would be to repeat the exercise with two specific examples of GM crop, most notably Bt maize and Bt cotton. The term ‘Bt’ is short for Bacillus thuringiensis, a bacterium common in soil which produces insecticidal crystal (Cry) proteins (Broderick et al. 2006; Sanchis and Bourguet, 2008; González-Cabrera et al., 2013; Pérez-Hedo et al. 2013; Muñoz et al., 2014). GM techniques allow for the genes that code for the Cry protein to be transferred to plant genomes and confer a degree of resistance to certain Lepidoptera and Colleoptera insects. Once the inserted genes are expressed in the plants they facilitate the production of Cry proteins which once ingested by the insect larvae causes an inhibition of feeding and starvation (Broderick et al. 2006). The Bt toxin is relatively specific to certain insects, and this specificity is an advantage in terms of limiting damage to non-target organisms, including mammals. However, the specificity of the Bt toxins also means that other pests such as Hemiptera (aphids, leafhoppers etc.) can be unaffected (Sharma and Ortiz 2000; Lu et al. 2010). Hence while the Bt-based resistance allows for the control of some pests the farmer may still have to adopt other measures such as pesticides for the control of those pests that are unaffected. Nonetheless, the Bt-based GM crops offer much potential within crop protection, including the possibility of inclusion within Integrated Pest Management (IPM).

Research over nearly 20 years has shown that ‘Bt’ crop varieties can perform well in terms of yield and given that the farmer saves money on pesticide applications, although the Bt seed may be more expensive than non-Bt, the gross margins are usually favourable when compared to non-Bt varieties (Wolfenbarger and Phifer, 2000; Morse et al., 2005a, 2008; Carpenter, 2010). However, these agronomic and economic advantages can vary a great deal depending on local context, and indeed in some contexts they may not be apparent at all (Finger et al., 2011). A further issue with the Bt toxin in that it can be passed up the food chain (Wolfenbarger and Phifer, 2000) and some damage to natural enemies of pests has been reported although the picture is a mixed one (Meissle et al. 2005; Obrist et al. 2006; Chen et al. 2009; Stephens et al. 2012). The potential toxicity of the Bt toxin towards humans has also been noted for a number of years (Shelton et al., 2002), although on balance the evidence to date suggests that there is no problem (Bakshi, 2003; Domingo and Bordonaba, 2011; Freedman, 2013). Nonetheless, this is a hotly contested arena (Dona and Arvanitoyannis, 2009; Rikard, 2010).

Differences would certainly be expected in the media reporting of Bt crop varieties for a number of reasons. For example, issues surrounding toxicity could be assumed to be especially relevant for crops such as maize that are widely grown and consumed by humans rather than crops that are primarily grown to produce fibre such as cotton. Also, the varied geographical spread of crops such as maize and cotton sharing the Bt genes may also have an influence. Hence based on these aspects alone it would be expected that the press reporting of Bt maize and Bt cotton since 1996 would be different, with perhaps a greater emphasis on ‘Safety, Accidents and Disasters’ for the Bt maize. Hence the objective of the research described in this paper was to explore the global press reporting of Bt maize and Bt cotton between 1996 and 2015 to see if there are such differences in topics associated with them and whether there are differences in reporting associated with geographical regions.

Methodology

Areas planted to Bt maize and Bt cotton were obtained from the annual updates available on the ISAAA website (www.isaaa.org). The website claims that:

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“ISAAA is a not-for-profit international organization that shares the benefits of crop biotechnology to various stakeholders, particularly resource-poor farmers in developing countries, through knowledge sharing initiatives and the transfer and delivery of proprietary biotechnology applications.” (www.isaaa.org; Accessed 14th June 2016)

The number of articles reporting Bt maize and Bt cotton over the period 1st January 1996 to 31st December 2015 (20 years in total) was found using the subscription-based Nexis database and search tools available via LexisNexis (internationalsales.lexisnexis.com/english-is/home.page). The sources selected in the Nexis database were ‘All news, All languages’. For each year the Nexis database was used to return the number of articles referring to 'Bt maize', ‘Bt corn’ and ‘Bt cotton’ at least once in the article. The outputs from the database search are the number of articles (after adjustment for duplication) that have the search term. The number of returns was set to provide the region(s) of focus in the newspaper story which is not necessarily the same as the region where the article was published. In some cases the article has no specific regional focus, and in others a number of regions may be mentioned. The regions were Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, North America and Oceania.

In addition to the geographical reference the outputs from the database were also set to include the 'topic' of the article. As noted above, the Nexis database provides a number of these but the following six were used as broad topics:

• Environment & Natural Resources• Government & Public Administration• Law & Legal System• Safety, Accidents & Disasters• Society, Social Welfare & Lifestyle• Trade & Development

A reorganisation of the Nexis website has resulted in the topic ‘Ethics’ no longer being employed. A single article may be classified into more than one of these topics. Some of the topics can be considered to span concerns often raised by critics of GM crops, most notably 'Environment & Natural Resources' and 'Safety, Accidents & Disasters'. For those who promote the advantages of GM crops the categories that may be of most relevance are probably 'Society, Social Welfare & Lifestyle' and 'Trade & development'. The other two categories - 'Government & Public Administration' and 'Law & legal Systems' are perhaps more neutral in the sense that they largely apply to the approval (or not) and regulation of the technology. But it is readily admitted that these assumptions are somewhat simplistic and an article that raises concerns over a GM crop could readily be classified within ‘Society, social welfare & lifestyle’.

It should be noted that the regional and topic classifications were made by the Nexis managers and not by the author. It was assumed that the Nexis classification of articles via topics and countries did not involve any bias.

Comparisons between regions and topics in terms of trend over time were made with correlation coefficients (degrees of freedom = 18). Comparisons between regions and topics in terms of the number of articles were made using the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test.

Results

The global crop areas planted to Bt cotton and Bt maize reported by ISAAA are shown in Figure 1a for the period 1996 to 2012. Areas are presented for varieties that just have the Bt gene and those that have the Bt gene ‘stacked’ (combined) with other genes that code for characteristics such as herbicide resistance and drought resistance. There are some intriguing differences between the crops in terms of area. The significant increase in area planted to stacked varieties of maize that include the Bt gene is

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very noticeable, reaching nearly 40 million hectares in 2012, while varieties that only have the Bt gene have tended to flat-line since the late 1990s. Clearly the combination of insect resistance with other GM traits has been popular in maize. For cotton the story is the reverse. GM varieties with stacked traits that include the Bt gene have remained at a relatively low level in terms of crop area while varieties only having the Bt gene have shown a steady increase in area albeit not to the same extent as the stacked Bt maize. There may be a number of reasons for this difference between the two crops. Insect pest attack is certainly of major importance in cotton so it is not difficult to imagine that an insect resistant variety, even if only resistant to some of the major pests, would be popular. Given that much cotton is grown in the developing world (India, China, Pakistan) where hand weeding predominates and farmers may not have ready access to herbicide or be able to afford it then it may well be that there is less demand for the herbicide resistant trait in that crop. The major maize growing countries are the USA (40% of the global harvest) and China, and in the USA in particular farmers routinely use herbicide for weed control and thus it is readily conceivable that a herbicide resistant trait would be appealing if it helps to keep weed control costs down.

<Figure 1 near here>

Figure 1b shows the total number of articles mentioning Bt cotton and Bt maize at least once between January 1996 and December 2015. For cotton the trend in article number more or less matches the trend in crop area, with a significant surge in article count after 2008. However, for Bt maize the pattern is quite different. There is a peak in article count between 1998 and 2001 and after that the count stabilises up until 2015. The late 1990s surge relates to the period just after the first Bt maize varieties became commercially available (1996) in the USA to help control the European corn borer (Ostrinia nubilalis), and a degree of press interest associated with that release in North America and elsewhere is understandable. Presumably the press interest in Bt maize declined after a couple of years and while it has never disappeared a similar surge to that of 1998-2001 has not been seen to date.

The number of articles mentioning Bt cotton and Bt maize classified into the six topic areas are shown in Figure 2 and correlation coefficients and Mann-Whitney statistics for the six topics are shown in Table 1 (Bt cotton) and Table 2 (Bt maize). A summary of the Mann-Whitney results for article counts is provided as Figure 3. For each crop the pattern in article count over the period 1996 to 2015 is similar across all of the topics although the article count does differ significantly between them. For both crops the count of articles classified as ‘Environment and natural resources’ (median for maize = 45 and for cotton = 66.5 articles/year) was significantly higher than for the other five topics and also for both crop the topic ‘Safety, accidents and disasters’ had the lowest count (median for maize = 7 and for cotton = 4.5 articles/year). The other four topics have broadly the same article count per annum. However, while the ranking of the topics in Figure 3 is similar for Bt cotton and Bt maize, the pattern of article counts between 1996 and 2015 was quite different for the two crops as can be seen from Figure 2 but also shown with the correlation coefficients in Table 3.

For maize the topics predominant during the late 1990s surge in interest are ‘Government and public administration’ (Figure 2a), ‘Society, social welfare and lifestyle’ (Figure 2c), ‘Law and legal systems’ (Figure 2d) and ‘Environment and natural resources’ (Figure 2f). These are perhaps not surprising given that much of the debate in those years would be expected to surround matters of regulation as well as impacts on consumers and the environment. What is intriguing is the low count of articles that cover ‘safety, accidents and disasters’ (Figure 2e) and ‘Trade and development’ (Figure 2b). It would appear that the press coverage was more geared towards regulation of the technology, and the legal issues that are associated with that such as farmers not being allowed to save seed for example, and environmental impact rather than human safety. The pattern for Bt cotton is similar to that of maize.

<Tables 1, 2 and 3 near here><Figures 2 and 3 near here>

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There do appear to be some notable differences between the three regions in terms of media reporting as shown in Figure 4. The peak of reporting Bt maize between 1998 and 2001 is especially pronounced in North America (Figure 4b) and Europe (Figure 4a) but is non-existent for Asia (Figure 4c). The number of articles mentioning Bt cotton is very low for Europe, as perhaps would be expected given the crop is not grown there, and static in North America. The significant surge in reporting of Bt cotton is largely due to reporting associated with Asia. Bt cotton was commercially released in China in 1997 and India, the country with the largest area of cotton in the world, in 2002, but the increase in media attention was largely driven by articles related to Bt cotton in India rather than China (Figure 4d). Indeed, it is interesting to note how the surge in media attention followed a rapid increase in Bt crop area in India, although there is a significant time lag.

<Figure 4 near here>

Discussion

The research reported here certainly has its limitations and the focus on press reporting and the use of the Nexis database has been critiqued in Morse (2016). While this research focussed solely on the Bt trait there is certainly scope for further work that looks at other traits such as herbicide resistance. For example, the retracted paper by Séralini et al. (2012) was based on research that explored the impact on rats that could occur from the ingestion of herbicide resistant maize and while the quality of the science was strongly disputed it certainly resulted in a great deal of vigorous debate that one could well imagine being picked up and reported by the press and this can be highly influential in terms of public opinion (Yaren, 2001; Miller and Conke, 2004; Marques et al., 2015). However for all of its limitations the Nexis database does allow a picture of press reporting at a global scale to be developed, and the results do seem to suggest that press retorting of Bt cotton and Bt maize have been quite different in terms of the number of articles and pattern of article count between 1996 and 2015. While it is convenient and enlightening to explore the reporting of GM crops as a group by the press it is also important to consider differences between the crops and traits. Bt confers just one trait to plants, notably resistance to some insect pests, but in some ways it has been the archetype GM crop for critics of the technology. Critics claim that there is danger of ‘gene escape’ from Bt varieties to wild relatives that could produce ‘super weeds’ with resistance to insects that attack them, and also, of course, the presence of a known toxin in the crop, albeit one that is claimed to be specific to certain insects, will inevitably raise concerns amongst consumers. The press picks up on such issues of concern to the public but can also serve to magnify them and in turn influence public opinion (Priest, 2001; Bauer, 2005; Moses, 2015). But it is interesting to see how reporting of Bt maize surged in the late 1990s but fell again and has remained at a relatively low level since then.

With Bt cotton the picture is intriguing. While a broad increase in press reporting does mirror an increase in global area of Bt cotton, a point made in Morse (2016) for GM crops in general, the surge in reporting linked to Asia from 2008 appears to be related to a rapid increase in Bt cotton area in India, reaching some 95% of the total cotton area grown in that country by 2014. Bt cotton was initially grown illegally in India in 2001 and was officially released in 2002 (Morse et al., 2005a, 2005b), but the release was controversial and there were some significant campaigns against the further release of GM cotton. In addition, there was some planting of a number of local produced but illegal cotton Bt varieties (Morse et al., 2005b). Hence in Figure 4d it can be seen that there is a degree of media interest over this period. The surge of media interest in Bt cotton in India took place as of 2008/2009, although it appeared to lag behind the increase in Bt cotton area in that country, and at the time of writing is not showing signs of abating. Thus unlike the relatively short peak of media interest for maize, a food crop, the media interest in Bt cotton, a predominantly non-food crop, in India remains pronounced. Indeed, it may well be that as the area of GM cotton grew so rapidly (and Bt cotton comprised the bulk of the GM cotton varieties) the media took time to respond to what was happening. But the increase in GM cotton area in India may not necessarily be the only reason for this sustained level of media interest and it is possible that there are other factors at play as well. For example, the World Development Report, published by the World Bank, did focus on agriculture and

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development in 2008 and GM crops was featured (World Bank, 2008) and there were a number of publications from 2005 onwards that suggested an increased suicide rate of farmers growing GM cotton in India (Sheridan, 2009). The latter has been linked to the relatively high cost of GM seed relative to local farmer incomes, and farmers being vulnerable to crop failure as a result of environmental factors and outbreaks of pests that are not susceptible to the Bt toxin.

With both Bt cotton and Bt maize the relatively small number of articles classified as ‘safety, accidents and disasters’ is perhaps surprising given the claim often made by critics of Bt causing damage to animal and human health, although it is possible that some of this health concern is reflected within the ‘society, social welfare and lifestyle’ category. The absence to date of conclusive evidence that consuming Bt maize products results in a negative impact on human health may well be part of the explanation for such low levels of reporting (Bakshi, 2003; Domingo and Bordonaba, 2011). If research does emerge which shows a deleterious effect of Bt maize on humans then no doubt it would result in another significant peak in reporting. But with both crops the large number of articles classified under ‘environment and natural resources’ is perhaps understandable given that the potential of environmental damage resulting from these crops has often been cited by critics. It is also clear that matters that surround regulation (the ‘government and public administration’ and ‘law and legal systems’ categories) have also received much attention in press reporting, and this is also not surprising given the newness of the technology and its potential, or at least claimed, detrimental impacts.

The media reflects what emerges out of scientific research, of course, but also picks up on other signals such as real or apparent disputes between scientists (Freedman, 2013, provides a flavour of this in the popular science magazine ‘Scientific American’), major reports on the technology be they in favour or not as well as statements by politicians (well informed or not), anti-GM demonstrations and other events. It is as well to remember that while the media may reflect what is happening in the world it interprets what it sees and can also influence society as set out in the ‘agenda setting’ theory, and this is especially relevant for complex fields such as GM crops where the public will rely strongly upon the media for its information. However, while the results of this research suggest that the media do pick up on some aspects of Bt crops more than others there is evidence that the pattern of reporting over time and between the two crops is not as one may expect. One would perhaps expect a more sustained media reporting, and indeed agenda setting, with regarding to Bt maize, a food crop, relative to Bt cotton, a non-food crop, but this does not seem to have been the case. If anything it is the media interest in Bt cotton that has surged and remains sustained at the time of writing, especially with regard to planting of the crop in India. Indeed, for the latter there is much scope for further research into the apparent time-lag between the surge in Bt cotton area and number of media reports, and how this may relate to any agendas that are being set. For example, is the rapid surge in media interest surrounding Bt cotton related to a perceived increase in competition between cotton producing nations at a time of global economic upheaval?

Conclusions

The results in this paper show how patterns of press reporting between 1996 and 2015 can be different for different GM crops having the same trait; in this case cotton and maize varieties sharing the same insect resistance trait. It is clear that while Bt cotton and Bt maize are ‘GM crops’ there are differences between them in terms of the extent and pattern of reporting in the media and these patterns are not necessarily what one would expect to see based on the fact that maize is a food crop while cotton is primarily grown for non-food purposes. The media picks up on many signals within the GM crop arena, and scientists are just some of the voices that will be heard, and can sometimes amplify them. This influence can be significant given that the public may rely heavily upon the media for its information regarding GM.

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Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the reviewers of the paper for their very helpful comments and suggestions for improvement.

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Table 1. Correlation coefficients (top figure) and Mann-Whitney statistics (bottom figure) comparing the press article counts across topics for Bt cotton.

Median article count

Government and Public

Administration

Environment and natural resources

Trade and development

Society, social

welfare and lifestyle

Law and legal

systems

Safety, accidents and

disastersMedian article countGovernment and Public Administration 21 1Environment and natural resources 66.5 0.949*** 1

346.5 ns (P=0.088)Trade and development 14 0.926*** 0.876*** 1

477.0 ns (P=0.072) 511.5**Society, social welfare and lifestyle 27 0.962*** 0.936*** 0.895*** 1

411.0 ns 483.0* 353.0 nsLaw and legal systems 19 0.971*** 0.923*** 0.911*** 0.937*** 1

457.0 ns 530.0*** 397.0 ns 458.0 nsSafety, accidents and disasters 4.5 0.94*** 0.928*** 0.853*** 0.973*** 0.924*** 1

542.0*** 598.0*** 498.0* 557.0*** 532.5***

Degrees of freedom for correlation coefficients = 18 ns = not significant at 0.05* P<0.05** P<0.01*** P<0.001

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Table 2. Correlation coefficients (top figure) and Mann-Whitney statistics (bottom figure) comparing the press article counts across topics for Bt maize.

Median article count

Government and Public

Administration

Environment and natural resources

Trade and development

Society, social welfare and

lifestyleLaw and

legal systems

Safety, accidents and

disastersMedian article countGovernment and Public Administration 25.5 1Environment and natural resources 45 0.946*** 1

299.5**Trade and development 13 0.759*** 0.727*** 1

537.5*** 594.0***Society, social welfare and lifestyle 19.5 0.944*** 0.964*** 0.792*** 1

456.0 ns 547.5*** 320.0*Law and legal systems 18 0.903*** 0.925*** 0.889*** 0.957*** 1

468.0 ns 549.0*** 353.5 ns 429.5 nsSafety, accidents and disasters 7 0.757*** 0.832*** 0.693*** 0.899*** 0.877*** 1

577.5*** 600.5*** 501.0* 552.0*** 529.5***

Degrees of freedom for correlation coefficients = 18 ns = not significant at 0.05* P<0.05** P<0.01*** P<0.001

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Table 3. Correlation coefficients for article counts of Bt cotton and Bt maize/corn.

Correlation

Topic CoefficientGovernment and Public Administration -0.148 nsEnvironment and natural resources -0.178 nsTrade and development -0.228 nsSociety, social welfare and lifestyle -0.251 nsLaw and legal systems -0.157 nsSafety, accidents and disasters -0.082 ns

Degrees of freedom for correlation coefficients = 18

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Figure 1. Crop area planted to Bt maize and Bt cotton (A) and total number of articles that mention the terms ‘Bt maize’ (Bt corn) and Bt cotton at least once.

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Area

pla

nted

(Mill

ion

ha)

Bt maize

Bt maize stacked

Bt cotton

Bt cotton stacked

0

100

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500

600

700

Tota

l num

ber o

f ite

ms

Cotton

Maize

A

B

Note: Crop areas are shown for varieties that only have the Bt gene and those that have the Bt gene ‘stacked’ with other genes such as herbicide resistance and drought tolerance.

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Figure 2. Number of news items mentioning Bt maize and Bt cotton focussed on a particular topic.

15

0

50

100

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250N

umbe

r of i

tem

sGovernment and public administration

Cotton

Maize

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Num

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f ite

ms

Trade and developmentCotton

Maize

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Society, social welfare and lifestyle

Cotton

Maize

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Num

ber o

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Law and legal systemsCotton

Maize

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Num

ber o

f ite

ms

Safety, accidents and disastersCotton

Maize

0

50

100

150

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250N

umbe

r of i

tem

sEnvironment and natural resourcesCotton

Maize

A B

C D

E F

Figure 3. Groupings of topic used for classifying articles. Solid bar represents topics where the medians are not significantly different (using the Mann Whitney test results from Tables 1 and 2.

(a) Bt cotton (Table 1)

(b) Bt maize (Table 2)

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Median countEnvironment and natural resources 66.5Society, social welfare and lifestyle 27Government and Public Administration 21Law and legal systems 19Trade and development 14Safety, accidents and disasters 4.5

Median countEnvironment and natural resources 45Government and Public Administration 25.5Society, social welfare and lifestyle 19.5Law and legal systems 18Trade and development 13Safety, accidents and disasters 7

Figure 4. Number of news items mentioning Bt maize and Bt cotton for three regions (Europe, North America and Asia; Figures A, B and C respectively) and for Bt cotton in India and China (Figure D).

0

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600

Num

ber o

f ite

ms

North AmericaCotton

Maize

0

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1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

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2015

Num

ber o

f ite

ms

AsiaCotton

Maize

0

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Num

ber o

f ite

ms

EuropeCotton

MaizeA B

C

0

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6

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10

12

14

0

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300

350

400

Bt co

tton

are

a (M

illio

n ha

)

Num

ber o

f ite

ms

Bt cottonIndia

China

India Bt area (million ha)

D

17