JOHANNESBURG - India, where genetically modified (GM) cotton has been a big hit with farmers, is expected to approve transgenic mustard and rice crops within the next few years, a biotech expert said on Tuesday

Genetic mustard is likely to get the go-ahead in less than a year, Sahandra Nair, managing director of India's Biotech Consortium, said.

"Rice is still at the contained-field-trial stage, so that will take longer, maybe around two years," he told Reuters on the sidelines of a biotech conference in South Africa.

The Biotech Consortium seeks to promote biotechnology by linking up research institutions, industry and government.

In 2002, India allowed transgenic cotton that contains a gene from Bacillus thuringiensis, a bacterium species. When infested by bollworm, it causes lethal paralysis in the digestive tract.

Traders have told Reuters in India that cotton production is expected to surge to around 25 million bales this year from an estimated 21.5 million bales previously, partly due to the use of transgenic seeds.

The area under GM cotton has jumped three-fold to 1.5 million hectares this year in India, world's third largest cotton producer, they said.

Nair said growth was expected to continue with the area under GM cotton cultivation growing to around 30 percent of the total in three years from only 7 percent last year.

Now four different companies are selling strains of GM cotton seeds up from only one originally, he added.