This column is a contribution from the Agricultural Biotechnology Council of Australia (ABCA). ABCA is an industry initiative established to increase public awareness of, and encourage informed debate and decision-making about, gene technology. The initiative is supported by a number of agricultural sectors and organisations all working to ensure the Australian farming sector can appropriately access and adopt this technology for the benefit of Australian agriculture.
As GM wheat field trials begin in the UK, Nobel and World Food Prize Laureates are asking that ambitious, exploratory and groundbreaking technologies be explored further to avert a looming hunger catastrophe
GM wheat trials approved in UK
The University of Oxford has received approval from the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs for field trials of GM wheat across four sites this season.
The approval follows advice from the independent non-departmental public body ACRE (Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment) that the trial posed an ‘extremely low’ risk to human health and the environment.
The US is also considering its options on introducing GM drought-tolerant wheat with information sessions, including surveys, being held across wheat-growing regions in America’s Midwest.
The new GM wheat, known as HB4, was approved for deregulation by the US Department of Agriculture in August 2024. Developed by the Argentinean company Bioceres, the variety incorporates drought tolerance via a sunflower gene. Bioceres reports that this variety improves yields by up to 43 per cent in low-rainfall environments.
In 2008, US Wheat Associates and the National Association of Wheat Growers drafted Wheat industry principles for biotechnology commercialization. The document outlines that the industry will support the introduction of GM wheat, once several principles have been addressed.
One of the principles relates to export markets. It means Bioceres must work with seven of the top 10 customers of US wheat, including Mexico, the Philippines, Japan, China, South Korea, Nigeria and Taiwan, to ensure market access.
Commercial cultivation of the GM variety has been achieved in Argentina and Brazil, and food and feed use approvals have been achieved in Australia, the US, Colombia, New Zealand, South Africa, Nigeria and Indonesia. Trials of GM wheat are also underway in Australia after Trigall Australia received approval to undertake field trials in August 2024.
Science needed to beat hunger catastrophe
A broad coalition of 153 Nobel and World Food Prize Laureates has banded together to avert a looming hunger catastrophe.
Their plea is for financial and political backing to develop ambitious, exploratory and groundbreaking technologies.
Their open letter predicts that humanity faces an “even more food-insecure, unstable world than exists today, worsened by a vicious cycle of conflict and food insecurity”.
The signatories suggest pursuing high-risk, high-reward scientific research with the goal of transforming the global food systems to meet the nutritional needs of everyone sustainably.
The letter cites several promising scientific breakthroughs and emerging fields of research that could be prioritised to boost food production despite existing and future challenges. These include improving photosynthesis in staple crops such as wheat and rice to optimise growth; developing cereals that can source nitrogen biologically and grow without fertiliser; and boosting research into hardy, nutrition-rich indigenous crops that have been largely overlooked for improvements.
