美国国家公共电台 NPR Damage From Wayward Weedkiller Keeps Growing

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Farmers in parts of the South are fighting each other over a weed-killing¹ chemical. Some are using it in combination with a new generation of genetically² engineered crops. Others are angry because it's blowing in the wind and damaging their crops. NPR's Dan Charles has the story.

DAN CHARLES, BYLINE³: Larry Steckel's job at the University of Tennessee is giving farmers weed-killing advice. And his phone is ringing nonstop.

LARRY STECKEL: I get lots and lots of calls - calls, text, pictures.

CHARLES: The pictures this summer show soybean plants with peculiar-looking leaves. The edges are curved upwards⁴, so the leaf looks like a cup. Those plants have been damaged by a weed killer⁵ called dicamba, which drifted over from neighboring farms. There are fields with these cupped leaves in Tennessee, Arkansas and Missouri. The damage covers hundreds of thousands of acres, maybe even a couple of million acres.

STECKEL: I've never seen anything even close to this. We have drift issues every year, a handful of fields, you know. But I've never seen anything like this.

CHARLES: Dicamba is not a new weed killer. It's been around for 50 years. But it's being used in a new way because the biotech company Monsanto is now selling new soybean and cotton varieties that have been genetically altered to tolerate dicamba. Farmers are spraying dicamba on those new crops. And it's working great, killing weeds that farmers have struggled to control lately.

The problem is dicamba is not always staying where it's supposed to. In hot weather, it turns into a gas that can drift, apparently⁶ for miles. And soybeans that have not been genetically engineered to tolerate dicamba are extremely sensitive to it. Tom Burnham, who farms land in Mississippi County, Ark., and across the state line in Missouri, has seen damage in his fields.

TOM BURNHAM: This technology - it cannot be allowed to exist. It can't - it cannot coexist with other competing crops.

CHARLES: Burnham and other farmers have appealed to state regulators in Arkansas, asking them to ban dicamba spray. Other farmers who've bought dicamba-tolerant seeds and want to use the chemical have argued just as passionately⁷ for their right to use dicamba. Arkansas' State Plant Board voted two weeks ago to ban most dicamba spraying this year. But the decision won't go into effect until it's approved by a committee of state legislators. Dan Charles, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF GONZALO GRAU'S "ONE FIVE-LEGGED CAT")

1 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

2 genetically   

adv.遗传上

参考例句：

• All the bees in the colony are genetically related. 同一群体的蜜蜂都有亲缘关系。
• Genetically modified foods have already arrived on American dinner tables. 经基因改造加工过的食物已端上了美国人的餐桌。 来自英汉非文学 - 生命科学 - 基因与食物

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 upwards   

adv.向上，在更高处...以上

参考例句：

• The trend of prices is still upwards.物价的趋向是仍在上涨。
• The smoke rose straight upwards.烟一直向上升。

5 killer   

n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者

参考例句：

• Heart attacks have become Britain's No.1 killer disease.心脏病已成为英国的头号致命疾病。
• The bulk of the evidence points to him as her killer.大量证据证明是他杀死她的。

6 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

7 passionately   

ad.热烈地，激烈地

参考例句：

• She could hate as passionately as she could love. 她能恨得咬牙切齿，也能爱得一往情深。
• He was passionately addicted to pop music. 他酷爱流行音乐。