IRM, Not IRS!

One of the first messages I read on Crop Talk this morning was from a farming asking if anyone else got a late IRM Audit notice. Another farmer asked to explain what IRM is so I tried to answer his question with my post below.

IRM stands for Insect Resistant Management as most of you know. It's an audit of your GMO corn refuge but has nothing to do with an IRS Audit.

"They tell me one out of ten farmers or so are selected randomly by the major seed companies who own Bt corn traits. Those majors must comply with EPA regs they agreed to in order to market the trait. They do this with IRM Audits.

The trait sheet and refuge requirements are huge now, I would post if I could easily.(I did post the sheet here.)

The letters are normally sent out after planting, this seems like a wierd time to get such a letter.

Various seed associations and other groups are hired to audit the list of farmers to audit the majors give to them.

The inspectors or auditors are trained on what to ask for and how to fill out the paperwork and deal with the farmer.

The inspector is given a list of names with a requirement of so many for each major company and recalled names from last year where the numbers did not come back right.

The inspector calls or shows up at your door with paper or computer to sit down and go over your refuge for the traits you bought that got pulled.

It's not too difficult if you understand what you bought and how you kept the refuge for those traits being audited.

It's scary if you don't know what you planted where or how you kept the refuge for it.

This is about as simple as I can put it early this morning."

Since most readers don't have to comply to these rules, what do you think of them or the process I described? One friend was surprised to see EPA involved with corn traits. For those who do grow GMO corn, what do you think of this process I described?

It would be a hassle to receive an IRM audit during harvest. All of mine occur during the summer months as I have blogged about in the past.

It's too wet to harvest and too wet to plant as rain moved across the midwest and Ohio this week. It's a good day to look at catalogs and websites like my friends in Pennsylvania like the ones my friends just put up at Keystone Ag Group.

I went to like that and there was my full editor back on blogspot! I thought, what the heck? Thank you Google or MicroSoft or whoever made this happen in my many reports and queries! I can share the pictures on my hard drive once more!

Have a great day,

Ed