Written by Charlotte Cunningham
Ahead of a forthcoming Defra consultation on post-Brexit regulation of new precision breeding techniques, the British Society of Plant Breeders (BSPB) has highlighted a recent industry survey which found that potential investment in new breeding techniques such as gene editing is being stifled by current EU rules. Charlotte Cunningham reports. The survey of 62 plant breeding companies in Europe, conducted by EU plant breeders’ organisation Euroseeds and published in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science, confirmed very strong commercial interest, regardless of company size, in using new breeding techniques (NBTs) across a wide range of crop species and traits. However, the survey also highlighted the negative impact on EU-based research and investment of a July 2018 European Court ruling which classified varieties developed using these new breeding techniques as GMOs. The ruling may also have hit smaller European breeding companies the hardest because they are less able to move research activities outside the EU. Key highlights of the Euroseeds survey: The 62 plant breeding companies surveyed comprise 10% large (> €450m turnover), 37% medium-sized (> €50m) and 53% small (< €50m); 100% of the large companies, 85% of medium-sized and close to 50% of small companies are actively engaged in…
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