" I heard it through the AgLine"

February 24, 2011

 

 

·        China to breed its own GM seeds

·        Monsanto steps up war on crop parasites

·        Peruvian potatoes headed to arctic vault

·        Strawberry genome to spawn better berries

·        Georgia’s biofuel dreams running on fumes

 

 

China to breed its own GM seeds

 

(Reuters via Yahoo! News) BEIJING – China will breed its own high-yield seeds and set up large seed companies to help ensure the country's food security in coming decades.

 

The State Council, China's cabinet, said in a statement that the world's largest grain producer aims to breed new seeds using China's own biotechnology and set up large seed-breeding bases by 2020.

 

Scientists said the move may work against the expansion plans of foreign companies such as DuPont <DD.N> that have taken a large share of China's corn seed market.

 

"The country will focus development on hybrid rice and corn -- particularly corn, where Pioneer already has a large share of the market and domestic seed firms are failing to compete," said one Chinese seed-breeding scientist.

 

"The government's concerns are grain security and how to boost farmers' incomes, while foreign companies will increase seed prices after they have occupied the market."

 

DuPont, which owns Pioneer Hi-Bred, is one of the world's largest agricultural seed companies and sees China as a particular opportunity for expansion.

 

A company spokesman in China contacted by Reuters declined to comment on its share of the corn seed market. Its "Xianyu" seeds are widely planted in the northeast and northern areas.

 

Many Chinese seed companies are small and inefficient and the domestic seed industry was hit with scandals in the 1990s when fake seeds were sold and farmers harvested nothing.

 

The State Council did not give any details but domestic seed companies, such as Yuan Longping High-tech Agriculture Co. Ltd <000998.SZ>, set up by Yuan Longping, the "father" of China's first hybrid rice strain, may get more support from Beijing.

 

Scientists said genetically modified seeds would not be a priority for Beijing for at least five years. Public debate over the safety of GMO food coupled with a long approval process meant China may not rush to use GMO seeds widely in the near term.

 

" Non-GMO seeds will still play a key role in boosting grain production in the coming five years," Huang Dafang, a researcher with the Biotechnology Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, told Reuters in December.

 

"GMO technology is a long-term national strategy and not for this or the next five-year plan," Huang said.

 

China approved the use of genetically modified strains of rice and corn in late 2009, opening the door for commercial production as soon as next year.

 

In the same meeting of the State Council on Tuesday, the government agreed to spend 62.5 billion yuan by 2013 to reinforce 21,300 small and medium-sized reservoirs. Another 25,000 reservoirs would be repaired before 2015.

 

The spending plan is part of the country's efforts to combat increasingly frequent natural disasters such as floods and drought.

 

A majority of the nation's existing reservoirs have had many problems in recent decades that have severely affected flood-control efforts, the statement said.

 

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Monsanto steps up war on crop parasites

 

(stltoday.com) – Parasitic nematodes are pesky microscopic worms that cause about $80 billion in crop damage around the world each year and remain one of the most stubborn pests in agriculture.

 

But biotech giant Monsanto aims to put a dent in their impact.

 

On Tuesday, the Creve Coeur-based company announced it had snapped up Divergence Inc., a neighboring biotechnology company in Creve Coeur that has worked for the past dozen years on products that control crop parasites. The companies have worked together since 2004 on nematode-resistant soybeans, and in 2008 released the sequence of the soybean cyst nematode genome. Going forward, research and development will focus on a seed treatment product to prevent damage from soybean cyst nematodes.

 

"It's a great fit," said Derek Rapp, CEO of Divergence Inc. "... We'll come together to make great things happen."

 

For the biotechnology business community in the St. Louis area, the acquisition represents a major success.

 

Divergence Inc. — formed in 1999 by James McCarter, a genome researcher at Washington University — has had the support of area biotech-boosting efforts, including the Bio-Research and Development Growth Park, the company's Creve Couer home base; and Prolog Ventures, a St. Louis-based venture capital company that focuses on life sciences.

 

"We're a product of the biotech efforts in the region," Rapp said. "I'm very proud to be a part of that."

 

In the past, farmers controlled nematodes with chemical compounds — organophosphates and carbamates — that were difficult to handle and environmentally damaging. The nematicide developed through this acquisition could fill the void created when such compounds were pulled from the market, the companies said.

 

"A challenge of the chemical nematicides is their safety profiles are less than desirable ..." said Tom Adams, a member of Monsanto's technolgoy leadership team. "The potential environmental benefits is one of the things we hope to exploit."

 

Adams said researchers would focus on soybean seed treatment first but will explore other compounds in the future.

 

"The goal is the middle of the decade for the nematicide product," Adams said. "Other products in the chemistry area are farther out."

 

All 25 full-time Divergence employees have accepted positions with Monsanto. The nematicide, when it hits the market, will be the first Divergence-developed product to reach farmers.

 

The companies would not disclose the terms of the sale Tuesday.

 

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Peruvian potatoes headed for arctic vault

 

(The Register) – More than 1,000 Peruvian potato varieties are destined for entombment in the Arctic's Svalbard Global Seed Vault [1] amid fears they may be threatened in their traditional home.

 

The BBC explains [2] that the Cusco Potato Park [3] will provide 1,500 distinct tuber examples for storage in the "doomsday vault", whose purpose is to "store duplicates (‘back-ups’) of all seed samples from the world’s crop collections".

 

The Potato Park is an initiative by six indigenous communities which "celebrates the tremendous diversity of native potato varieties and other native Andean crops characteristic of Andean food systems". Among the tremendous tubers it grows is the impressive Puma Maki ("Puma's Foot [4]") variety, pictured.

 

While the 10,000 hectare park plays a vital role in maintaining potato diversity, its long-term viability is not assured. Lino Mamani, one of the "potato guardians", explained: "Climate change will mean that traditional methods of maintaining this collection can no longer provide absolute guarantees.

 

"Sending seeds to the [vault] will help us to provide a valuable back-up collection – the vault was built for the global community and we are going to use it."

 

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is described as "ultimate insurance policy for the world’s food supply". Operated by the Global Crop Diversity Trust, it was built to protect its contents from any natural or man-man disaster, and currently holds 500,000 samples, including maize, rice, wheat, lettuce and barley.

 

The latest batch of crops to pass through the entrance (pictured, above) include "chilli peppers, melons, peanuts, beans, sesame, hibiscus, squash, gourd, and 448 different varieties of sorghum".

 

When the Peruvian spuds join them, the vault will be home to over a third of the Andes' 4,000 native potato varieties.

 

The Global Crop Diversity Trust executive director, Cary Fowler, said: "The Potato Park highlights the active role that individual communities play in creating and conserving diversity. This partnership demonstrates the critical importance of the seed vault in backing up conservation efforts of all kinds."

 

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Strawberry genome to spawn better berries

 

(AP via Yahoo! News) CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Farmers have long struggled with getting ripe strawberries to market in good shape, but scientists say the recent mapping of the wild strawberry's genome may help them produce berries that are cheaper and easier to grow and arrive in stores in peak condition.

 

The woodland strawberry has become one of only a handful of food plants to have its genetic sequence charted, and scientists said the map could help them cut years off the time that it would take to produce similar results with traditional plant breeding techniques. But farmers and researchers also say the strawberry's genome isn't likely to be used to its full potential because of consumers' concerns about genetically modified foods.

 

Nate Nourse, who grows strawberries and other berries in Whately, Mass., said he saw a lot of potential in the strawberry genome map. Many of the strawberries he sells are what he calls June strawberries — sweet, sugary and something special for the few summer weeks they're available.

 

"But you can't hardly ship them because of the sugar content in them. The more sugar, the less shelf life," he said. He added, "This genetic stuff is going to help people understand what it is to make the sugars better."

 

He hoped the sequencing of the woodland strawberry genome would speed up the breeding process and make more reliable work that he describes now as a crap shoot. But, he said, that work can't include any sort of genetic modification — his customers wouldn't buy it.

 

Kevin Folta, an associate professor of horticulture at the University of Florida and one of the scientists who helped map the strawberry's genome, said that was one reason the strawberry industry contributed very little of the $200,000 needed to pay for the project. Growers didn't want to create a public relations problem for themselves.

 

"Being involved in a sequencing project could give a false impression of doing genetically modified technology on strawberries," he said.

 

Researchers said they're most likely to use the genome to try to develop plants that resist diseases and produce berries that hold up better while being shipped, last longer on shelves and cost less to grow. Down the road, they may also aim for better-tasting berries, although Folta said better flavor isn't growers' first concern.

 

"You don't taste in the store," he said, but consumers might not buy packages of berries because they haven't held up well during shipping.

 

Janet Slovin, a U.S. Department of Agriculture plant molecular biologist who worked on the strawberry genome project, said the research also has potential for similar changes in a long list of other members of the Rosaceae family, including apples, plums, peaches, raspberries and pears. Researchers who focus on those fruits worked on the sequencing team because the strawberry is related closely enough to be a good stand-in for them.

 

"This is really the lab rat for strawberries," Slovin said.

 

Folta, Slovin and 73 other researchers scattered around the world started working on the woodland strawberry genome three years ago, looking for a way to speed up plant breeding aimed at building a better berry.

 

Breeders, working mainly in California and Florida, have bred berries that are harder and less likely to bruise during shipping or that easily separate from their stems for easier picking. At least one variety, Slavin said, is grown for the long sturdy stem that lets it be easily dipped in melted chocolate at weddings.

 

Traditional breeding, however, involves growing thousands of plants, crossing them with numerous others, then growing those crosses, and repeating the steps over and over for five, 10, even 15 years to find even one plant that exhibits the trait breeders want. Some research never pans out at all.

 

With the genome sequenced, Folta said, researchers can instead grow a plant to seedling size, check it for the gene that controls the trait they're looking for, and, if it's there, focus breeding efforts on that plant.

 

"The last decade has really been an explosion of resources in strawberry genomics; we've really advanced what we know about strawberries, but we've always had to take time to initiate a first step, essentially going on a hunt to find the genes of interest," Folta said, adding, "With the genome in hand, you don't have to take that first step."

 

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Georgia’s biofuel dreams running on fumes

 

(ajc.com) – Four years ago, in a muddy Mitchell County field, Georgia entered the big leagues of biomass production. Ground was broken in January 2007 outside Camilla for the largest biofuel factory in the Southeast.

 

Politicians one-upped one another with paeans to plans for the lowly corn cob that would bring 300 jobs to rural South Georgia, pump $267 million into the state economy, scrub the nation’s polluted air and break dependence on foreign oil.

 

One day, the dreamers said, Georgia would turn corn, pine trees, yeast, soy beans, peanut shells — any rapidly grown feed stock — into gasoline for cars or diesel for trucks. Alternative energy factories would dot the countryside. Georgia would be transformed into the “Saudi Arabia of biomass.”

 

Four years later, the state’s alternative energy future is hobbled. Southwest Georgia Ethanol, the corn-to-fuel factory in Camilla, filed for bankruptcy earlier this month. Range Fuels, the state’s prized cellulosic (i.e. not corn) ethanol factory in Soperton, closed its doors in January.

 

Biodiesel plants in Atlanta, Rome, Perry and beyond have either curtailed or ceased production. Today, Georgia only boasts a few unsexy wood pellet factories.

 

Visions of an alternative fuel Mecca remain foggy even after local, state and federal agencies pumped tens of millions of tax dollars into two dozen biomass ventures.

 

“Expectations were too high and people promised things they just couldn’t deliver,” said Sam Shelton, research director for Georgia Tech’s Strategic Energy Institute. “Renewable fuels are not going to make big, rapid growth without a lot of energy policy and mandates from the state and federal governments.”

 

Biomass proponents caution it’s too early to dig graves for ethanol and biodiesel. Some of the state’s biodiesel makers say they’ll soon ramp up production, thanks to renewal of a federal subsidy. The Camilla ethanol factory is still producing and, with a cash infusion or corporate takeover, might one day flourish.

 

Unbowed, the state’s biomass boosters tout the $1 billion invested in renewable energy ventures the past five years. And they preach the wonders of the next can’t-miss energy alternatives, whether it’s leafy miscanthus or “drop-in” fuels.

 

“We’ve had more announced bioenergy projects than any other state in the nation and that says a lot about what we have to offer,” said Jill Stuckey, the state’s tireless alternative energy advocate. “I don’t think we’ll be the Saudi Arabia of biomass, but I want Georgia to be independent from foreign sources of oil. Just give me 15 years and we’ll do it.”

 

 

Biofuel boom, then bust

 

Georgia jumped on the bio-fuel bandwagon in 2006, designating the rural-based industry an economic development priority eligible for financial incentives. The Herty Advanced Materials Development Center in Savannah, a state-funded development authority, predicted 60,000 jobs, 30 alternative-fuel factories and a $30 billion economic impact statewide by 2017.

 

At first, the alternative energy industry blossomed. Ethanol, biodiesel and pellet plants dotted the state. Southwest in Camilla imported trainloads of corn from the Midwest to make ethanol. Range Fuels, bankrolled with $82 million in state and federal subsidies, built its plant in Soperton.

 

FRAM Renewable Fuels in Baxley produced wood pellets for environmentally conscious European utilities. Former President Jimmy Carter welcomed Alterra Bioenergy, and its claim to brew 30 million gallons of biodiesel, to his hometown of Plains.

 

Today, the alternative energy landscape is littered with padlocked distilleries, empty storage tanks and broken dreams. Unemployment in Treutlen County, where the Range factory is located, is 13 percent. Range’s promised 69 jobs dwindled to a few when the ethanol maker shut its doors last month.

 

“We were hoping they’d be hiring instead of laying off,” said John Lee, the county’s business recruiter.

 

Forisk Consulting, an Athens-based forestry research firm, compiled a list last month of 36 wood-based biofuel projects once planned for Georgia. Only nine are in operation. Two are under construction. Most of the remainder are “proposed.”

 

“People had high hopes, but that’s not to say they won’t become reality in a few years,” said Amanda Lang, operations manager for Forisk. “These are capital-intensive projects and it’s hard to secure funding needed to develop that technology.”

 

 

Tales of the industry

 

Here’s what happened to industry stalwarts in Georgia:

 

Southwest Georgia Ethanol. Its ethanol-brewing subsidiary filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, yet it continues production. The company lost $2.2 million in fiscal 2010 and lists debt of $134 million, according to its SEC filing.

 

CFO Lawrence Kamp blamed rising corn costs and too-low ethanol prices. Importing 100,000 bushels of corn daily by train from the Midwest also proved costly (the company owes Norfolk Southern and CSX more than $2.1 million).

 

“It never did make sense why they’d ship corn from the Midwest to their plant to make ethanol rather than make ethanol up there in plants that already exist and ship the ethanol down here,” said Georgia Tech’s Shelton.

 

? Range Fuels. The $225 million factory closed last month after reportedly making only a small batch of cellulosic ethanol. The Colorado-based company planned to turn tree limbs, grasses, cornstalks and garbage into ethanol.

 

Range had raised $158 million privately, $76 million from the U.S. Department of Energy and $6.2 million from the state of Georgia. It also received an $80 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Most of the money has been spent on construction and equipment, so recovery is unlikely. Range says it will restart production once it raises more capital.

 

? Biodiesel. More than a dozen biodiesel factories, which turn soybeans, restaurant grease and chicken fat into a diesel additive, were planned and/or operating across Georgia a few years ago. Now, virtually all of them have ceased or greatly curtailed production.

 

“There’s no demand in the local market. We can’t rely on the tax incentives and support from Congress. And the pricing of raw materials is a real challenge,” said Bobby Heiser, a partner in BullDog Biodiesel in Ellenwood. “And Europe, once a large market for us, placed very steep tariffs specifically against biodiesel that originated in the U.S.”

 

 

Subsidies a lifeblood

 

The nation’s biodiesel and ethanol producers live and die on federal and state subsidies. The $1-a-gallon tax credit for diesel refiners expired in 2009 and decimated the industry. BullDog stayed open, but slashed its work force from 30 to six employees.

 

Georgia, unlike many other states, offers no mandates for biodiesel and ethanol usage.

 

“Really the only way we’ll replace gas and diesel is if we have government mandates or oil gets over $100 a barrel and stays there and people will become convinced it will never come back down,” Shelton said.

 

Washington recently rejuvenated the biofuel industry.

 

Congress last December reauthorized the $1-a-gallon biodiesel tax credit. BullDog’s Heiser said he’ll soon re-hire 15 laid-off employees.

 

The EPA last year approved blended gasoline with as much as 15 percent ethanol for vehicles produced in 2007 or later. The agency later extended the E15 blend to cars and light trucks built between 2001 and 2006.

 

Georgia’s wood pellet business, turning trees and timber scrap into fuel, is poised for a comeback, too. Boosters point to this year’s expected opening of the massive Georgia Biomass factory in Waycross as evidence of a robust pellet industry. The company, owned by two European utilities, could produce 750,000 tons of pellets annually to be shipped to Germany and Sweden.

 

After a dreadful 2009, production nearly doubled to 140,000 tons last year for FRAM Fuels. Harold Arnold, the company’s president, is shooting for 200,000 tons this year.

 

“We’re still bullish on the renewable fuel industry, and we’ll see more consumption coming on line in the United States, Europe and certainly in Asia,” Arnold said. “But we need to make renewable fuels more attractive through incentives for commercial-sized operations like hospitals and apartment buildings. That will come.”

 

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