Biotechnology in Food Security

1
Biotechnology in Food Security

• Dr TJ Higgins
• CSIRO Plant Industry
• 4 March 2009

2
The Outlook
Global population growth
Increased demand for agricultural products

• Food
• Feed
• Biomaterials (inc. fuel)

3
The global outlook

• By 2025 global food output must increase by about
  75.
• By then we will need
• 2.8 billion tonnes of cereals
• 5.3 billion tonnes of other crops
• 1.6 billion tonnes of animal products

4
Average Yield and Record Yield of Major Crops
Abiotic Biotic Losses Abiotic Losses Biotic
Losses Average Yield
20
15
10
Tonnes / ha
5
2.1
4.6
1.7
2.7
2.8
1.6
1.9
0
Wheat
Barley
Maize
Oats
Sorghum
Soybean
Rice
Modified from Boyer 1987
5
Agriculture must

• increase yield AND quality of products
• restore and maintain the environment
• produce affordable food
• include the needs of the poor and under nourished
• produce renewable energy and more bio-based
  materials

6
Modern biotechnology breeding and genes
Gregor Mendel
7
Biotechnology includes modern breeding methods

• Modernconventional breeding is dynamic
• Employs one or more of
• Mutagenesis
• Interspecific Hybrids
• Intergeneric Hybrids
• Molecular Markers
• Doubled Haploids
• Gene Technology
• Male Sterility for Hybrids
• Digital Image Phenotyping
• New Analytical Statistics
• Genomics and Bioinformatics

8
How can biotechnology (including GM) help?
GM is one arm of breeding but it offers
improvements to plants and animals that
conventional breeding cannot.

• GM has the potential to
• Improve disease management
• Improve pest management
• Improve nutrition / nutrient use efficiency
• Enhance product quality and nutritional content
• -For now, it will have less impact on
  agricultures adaptability to climate change
  and complex environmental stresses- multigenic
  control

9
GM Crops Here and Now and Soon
Soybean Maize Cotton Canola Papaya Squash Tomato S
ugarbeet Sweet Pepper Eggplant Sugarcane Rice Whe
at
10
Area planted to GM crops worldwide
140
120
Areaplantedto GMcrops(millions of hectares)
100
80
60
40
20
0
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
Source James, ISAAA, 2008
11
Experience with GM cotton tackling pests
GM cotton was first grown in Australia in 1996
and now makes up over 90 of the Australian
cotton crop. Proven benefits of GM
insect-resistant cotton in Australia

• Reduced overall pesticide application by about
  80.
• Reduced endosulfan use by about 90.
• GM cotton is preferentially grown near the
  homestead and waterways.
• Results not possible without GM.

12
2008-CONVENTIONAL vs GM CANOLAin AUSTRALIA
Old Man with New Technology
Old Man with Old Technology
Source Walter Farming
13
A 2nd Generation Example Golden Rice
400 million people rely on rice as their staple
food, but white rice does not have Vitamin A.

• Vitamin A deficiencies cause
• 250,000 to 500,000 children to go blind every
  year and more than half of these will also die
  within a year,
• the immune system to be compromised increasing
  the chances of other severe illness.

Source www.goldenrice.org
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Golden Rice
15
Fertiliser N is an agricultural/environmental
issue

• Nitrogen is the key input to global agriculture
• Annual value gt 50 billion
• Less than 50 of nitrogen is absorbed
• Economic inefficiency for farmers
• Unabsorbed nitrogen damages the environment
• Water pollution
• Air pollution (Greenhouse Gas Emissions)

Source Norsk Hydro www.hydro.com/library/attachme
nts/en/investor_relations/presentations/enger_sssb
.pdf, 13 Jun 07
16
Nitrogen use efficiency gene in canola
Seed yield (kg / Ha)
4400
Transgenic
NUE Canola
NUE Canola
4000
Conventional
3600
2
2
3200
1
1
2800
No Gene
Gene
2400
Arrow 1
2000
Same yield, 66 less N
NUE Canola
Conventional Canola
Arrow 2
1600
33 Higher yield, same N
1200
0
50
100
150
200
250
Nitrogen application level (kg / Ha)
Source Arcadia Bioscience
17
Nitrogen use efficient crops

• Existing (but not yet commercial)
• Canola
• Rice
• In development
• Sorghum
• Corn
• Wheat
• Sugar beet

Source Arcadia Bioscience
18
Phosphorus efficient plants

• Phosphorus is the next key nutrient after
  nitrogen.
• Crop and pasture growth is reduced by lack of
  phosphorus.

• Opportunity
• CSIRO has developed GM plants that are better
  able to get phosphorus from organic forms in the
  soil.
• These plants could help unlock the big bank of
  soil phosphorus and reduce fertiliser costs.

19
Unlocking soil phosphorus for plant growth
Converting Phytate to available Phosphorus
Non-GM plants with no change
Plants with added Phytase gene
Alan Richardson
20
Acid soils reduce plant growth
Source Manny Delhaize
21
Aluminium tolerance gene transferred from wheat
to barley
Transgenic

• Acid tolerant wheat
• Plants protect themselves from acid
  soils by excreting malate from the root
  tips
• Scientists have isolated the gene that
  controls the release of malate
• Opportunity
• To enhance the aluminium tolerance of
  crops and pastures
• Using gene technology to insert the gene
  into sensitive plants, such as barley or
  lucerne

Non-transgenic
Source Manny Delhaize
22
Smarter water use by crops?
Reduced leaf rolling
Reduced leaf temperature
With gene
Without gene
With gene
Without gene
SourceMonsanto
23
Wheat rust control
From resistance breeding Brennan and Murray
1998 Stem 99M pa Leaf 85M pa Stripe 161M
pa Cost of chemicals for stripe rust
control 80-100M in 2005
24
GM solution transgene cassettes ?

• Clone and combine several natural effective
  genes in a single cassette so that they get
  transmitted as a unit during breeding of
  transgenic wheat
• These genes could include synthetic genes

Sr2
Yr18/Lr34
Sr31
Sr24
Sr26
Source Jeff Ellis
25
Rust resistance gene works in GM corn
26
NEW OPPORTUNITIES WITH OILSEED CROPS
Oil for plastics
Oil for industry fuel
Oil with special pharmaceuticalor nutritional
traits
Allan Green
27
Genetically engineered plant oils

• Improved cooking oils
• Specialty nutritional oils
• Novel industrial oils

Oilseeds are the main focus, but can also be
achieved in oil palm
Allan Green
28
Omega-3 health benefits

• Prevention of coronary heart disease
• Lower blood pressure
• Lower plasma, serum lipids
• Anti-thrombotic

• Anti-inflammatory
• Neuropsychiatric disorders
• Obesity, weight loss
• Asthma
• Kidney liver disorders

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The Future of Biotech (inc GM) Plants

• In 2008, 13.3 million GM farmers produced crops
  on 125 million hectares
• Increasing adoption of GM by China and India
  likely to influence the uptake of GM in Asia.
• 2006-2015 is predicted to see significantly
  higher growth of GM crops in Asia.
• Modest increases in small farmer income from GM
  crops is helping achieve the Millennium
  Development Goals.
• Responsible stewardship and good farming
  practices will remain critical to the success of
  GM crops.

Source James, ISAAA, 2008
30
FSANZ 2007 survey of 1200 Australians

• Food safety a major concern for 9
  (drought/water is 60), but
• 51 had some specific food safety concerns
• Without prompting consumers had concerns about
  fresh fruit and vegetables (25), meat
  (19)..GM food (3).
• 82 referred to label when buying
• Attention to use-by-date (73), origin (59),
  sugar (62),
• fat (57)GM (27).free range (24).
• Label the major source of information and
  trusted.
• Surprise to some average consumer is quite
  rational, notwithstanding the onslaught from a
  generally biased media

31
Thank you
CSIRO Plant Industry Dr TJ Higgins Deputy
Chief Phone [phone] Email
tj.higgins_at_csiro.au Web www.csiro.au/pi