improved wheat varieties in the nearer-term,” says Gardner. “With initial breeding advances, we believe we can bring a more immediate infusion of technology to wheat growers while biotech traits are still in development.”

Gardner adds that the recent tri-lateral statement signed by grower groups and others in Canada, the U.S. and Australia is just one example of the renewed interest in exploring what opportunities might exist for biotechnology investment in wheat.

“It is also encouraging that a number of other public and private parties have already invested or are currently investing in biotechnology for wheat. But bringing a new biotech trait to market takes time,” says Gardner. “Monsanto does not anticipate a biotech wheat product to emerge from our R&D pipeline for at least eight to 10 years. This is consistent with the development timelines we’ve seen with the other biotech traits we have developed.”

Monsanto remains committed to ongoing dialogue with the wheat industry and farmers to support the successful introduction of new technologies in wheat. “Monsanto will work with all industry players to determine if, when and how a biotech wheat trait might be brought to market while respecting customer choices,” he says.

Long-term Planning

Monsanto is not the only agricultural company investing in wheat development. Other companies, including Syngenta, BASF and Dow AgroSciences, are looking for new solutions as many existing wheat varieties are being threatened by yield robbing diseases such as fusarium head blight and Ug99, which is currently moving across African wheat fields. In 2009, the

 

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International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre released a report called Wheat Facts and Futures 2009. The report noted that in seven of the past 10 years world wheat consumption has exceeded production supply and that production continues to fall behind world population growth.

However, biotech crops present a number of environmental, agronomic and economic benefits for growers and have been widely adopted since they were first introduced more than 13 years ago. “Growers have seen the benefits this technology has brought to other crops like corn, soybeans and cotton,” says Gardner. “Wheat holds the potential to be one of our top three crop platforms. However, we also recognize that this is a long-term investment in research and development through both breeding and biotechnology.”

Coppock also says that there is the need for both exporting and importing countries of wheat globally to create regulatory measures for acceptable tolerance levels to aid a synchronized introduction. “I consider all of these new developments in the wheat industry this year as the starting bell for all those involved in the industry…as it can take at least a decade to get a new trait to market,” he says.

Gardner stresses that within the various geographies where wheat is grown, it is a crop particularly challenged by the core issues of water availability, fertilizer efficiency and declining global acres. “We believe we have the technology tools today to help wheat growers meaningfully address these challenges,” says Gardner. “By utilizing approaches to more meaningfully address these challenges – using both breeding and biotechnology – we believe wheat farmers can someday benefit through higher-yielding technologies that may help contribute to a consistent supply, which, in turn, could also help stabilize prices for wheat buyers and consumers.” Shannon Schindle

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