Narrative for change – towards a trait impact dialogue
Last week, UK’s Precision Breeding Act passed into law. The new act allows for the use of gene editing in crops, provided that the genetic changes could also have been produced naturally or through traditional crossbreeding programs already in use today.
Challenges in sustainable agricultural production over the past decade and a renewed regulatory push in countries such as UK, USA, Japan, Canada, Australia, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador and Chile will be setting the stage for the introduction of healthier and better tasting fruit and vegetables and the production of climate and environment smart commodity crops.
As many of my colleagues will point out, we are not really building a completely “new stage”, as breeders have been studying plant characteristics for over two centuries. Indeed, trait development and breeding activities are not new and have successfully led to the development of novel varieties with enhanced yield and improved biotic and abiotic stress tolerance. However, it is not just old wine in a new bottle. Gene editing will be unlocking new possibilities to further add more impactful traits to our food and feed production system.
For many novel traits, we will probably still stick to mining the wealth of native traits we have available via genetic variation present in our well-preserved germplasm collections. By screening multiple accessions of wild species and heirloom varieties, we can discover native traits, which can be nicely cross into elite varieties using marker-assisted backcrossing.
For other traits, gene-editing technologies will create a short-cut into the traditional trait development process, by creating precise and novel genetic variation - sometimes concurrently at multiple loci - directly into elite germplasm, avoiding tedious trait mapping and complex, in some cases even sluggish backcrossing approaches.
To meet the rapidly evolving needs of farmers, farming communities together with their customers, indicated to be interested in engineered traits, either created from a natural gene or trait mechanism, present in a crossable plant’s genome or alternatively derived from genes from other plants and species.
Raised on a farm and working most of my career in crop development, with this post, I would like to “plant the seed” for a narrative for change. Although, I completely understand the sensitivity of gene editing and engineering technologies and the complexity regarding IP ownership and regulatory frameworks and although I have been following press releases in this area with great interest, I would like to push for a change in the narrative.
Instead of having technology-centered discussions, I would like to move towards an impact dialogue where participants focus more on the potential impact, both negative and positive, a new trait technology might have. Involving all stakeholders, each novel trait solution should be evaluated and compared to other already existing solutions and/or novel approaches that are currently under development and trialing.
A review could include a broad array of questions. Just listing a few here to “set the tone”. What is the potential impact of a novel trait on consumers, farmers, animals and the environment? Will this trait improve a farmer’s income? Will it allow a decent return on investment for the inventors or breeders who substantially invested in researching the trait? Will the trait be made available to all farmers? And will the trait concept work both in hybrid and open pollinated seed background? Does the trait or related product create farmer dependence, or can it potentially undermine a farmer’s freedom of choice? Can it provide farmers with more sustainable ways to protect their crop, while reducing pesticide or fertilizer use? Will this trait contribute to safeguarding the land, water and air resources that make food production possible? Are the trait compounds, at relevant in planta concentrations safe for consumers, farmers, animals and planet?
Finally, I would like to point out that agricultural technologies, including the above-mentioned trait innovations, will never be the only answer to an impactful change. Not only the agricultural sector, but also governments have an unprecedented opportunity to catalyze investment at scale to drive a positive change. Alternative business model innovation will be required to incentivize crop development and food systems transformation. Policies and strong governance on water rights, climate change, nature conservation, land tenure, farmer’s support and subsidies will play a vital role to make a transition into environmental and climate smart agriculture.
