Beating the $22 billion bug.

0 Comments | M2 Presswire, February, 2003

M2 PRESSWIRE-10 February 2003-ARS: Beating the $22 billion bug(C)1994-2003 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD RDATE:02072003 Eradication of the scourge of the South--better known as the boll weevil--is now a major success, thanks in large part to research from the Agricultural Research Service. The boll weevil wreaked havoc on the American cotton industry, with yield losses and control costs totaling more than $22 billion since its 1892 arrival in the United States.

As boll weevils spread, they forced radical economic and social changes in areas that had been almost completely dependent on cotton production. Many experts consider the boll weevil second only to the Civil War as an agent of change in the South. For example, the year before boll weevils marched into...