UN STI Biotech

7/26/2019 UN STI Biotech

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Agricultural Biotechnology: Not Just GMOs

and Not Just for Commercial Farmers

Carl Pray

Rutgers University

[email protected]


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The Biotech in Plants: Defined by Research

Tools and Society Conventional plant breedingcrossing and mutation

Plant tissue culturemake a whole plant from a few cells

Genetic engineering (GE)also known as genetic

modification (GM) also Genetically Modified Organisms

(GMOs) Genomics and marker assisted breeding or molecular

breeding

New tools for suppressing or strengthening the impact of

genes

RNA interference for developing new biological pesticides and fertilizers

for pest control in organic and conventional crops (mid 2000s)

New gene editing technologies (NGETs)Zinc Fingers and TALENS

(mid 2000s) and Crispr-CAS9 (2012)

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What did GMOs do?

Enabled farmers to better control insects and weeds in

soybeans, corn, cotton and canola

Millions of small farmers in India and Chinamainly Bt cotton

Reduces insecticide use in countries like China where pesticides wereused to control pests

Increases productivity in countries like India where pests were not

controlled by chemicals

Improves human health and environment

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Biotech Crops Spread Quickly

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Impact on industry: Six major biotech/seed/chemical firms

and this may go to 4 soon.

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Agricultural research and development (R&D) spending by major multinational corporations in 2012

CompanyCountry of

incorporationSector of R&D activity

Agricultural

R&D spending *

(Million U.S. $)

Principal agricultural R&D

locations

Bayer GermanyAg. chemical, crop seed,

animal health1,517

Germany, France, Belgium,

Netherlands, U.S., Japan

Syngenta Switzerland Ag. chemical, crop seed 1,165Switzerland, UK, U.S.,

China, Australia

Monsanto U.S. Ag. chemical, crop seed 1,074U.S., France, Brazil,

Argentina, India

BASF GermanyAg. chemical, crop seed,

animal nutrition1,001 Germany, U.S., India

DuPont U.S.

Ag. chemical, crop seed, food

ingredients 553 U.S., France, Japan, India

Dow U.S. Ag. chemical, crop seed 427U.S., Japan, Argentina,

Puerto Rico

Note: * Estimate based on company annual reports

Source: Fuglie et al 2011 with 2012 R&D data assembled from company annual reports by Anwar Naseem


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Initial impacts of Crispr-CAS9 and RNAi on Ag

Make gene editing much cheaper and faster

Crisp-CAS9 a naturally occurring component of bacteria that they use to

defend themselves from viruses

CAS9 an enzyme that cuts DNA

Crispr a piece of DNA that guides CAS to a specific place on the DNA of

the target plant and disables, amplifies or replaces genes at the right

place on the plants genome.

Can precisely edit many target genes at the same time

Could get world out of the corn, cotton, soybean GM trap and

allow important improvements in stress resistance of

vegetables orphan crops, etc

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Early impact disease control and quality traits

Eliminate fusarium head blight in wheatdestroys crop andeating infected wheat causes severe diarrhea and death in

human and livestock.

Healthy soy bean oil 2017 in US9


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Change structure of industry?

More universities producing new technology for crops

Small ag biotech companies emerging from Universities doing

research on new gene editing technology - Calyxt, Caribou

Biosciences, Cibus, Arcadia.

Seed companies use Crispr to increase the productivity of

their breeding program

Massive investment in Crispr in China

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China probably leads US (and ROW) in

numbers of Crispr patents

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Will new technologies allow the development of

new crop varieties by small & medium companies?

Depends on how they are regulated:

If they are regulated like GMOs in Europe, large companies

will dominate buying small companies

If regulated like Canada (product based) then smallcompanies could prosper.

Small companies in China and India are likely to be able to use

these technologies anyway because regulators can notdifferentiate plant make from these technologies from others.

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Middle income and poor countries should

exploit these new gene editing technologies notban them with precautionary regulations

Big companies want to look good by helping the poor. So make

use of this impulse to get these research tools the small and

medium companies that will serve small farms.

Partnerships between small local companies and US, European

or Chinese companies can be developed with financing and

connections from donors and local governments.

Governments of big countries can control multinationals through

anti-monopoly regulation, controls on seed prices and royalties

and bargaining on technology transfer when companies want to

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These technologies can help meet the SDGs 1

and 2 reducing poverty and hunger.

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Flood tolerant rice

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UN STI Biotech