BRITISH crop research needs at least £20m of Government funding annually to bring it up to speed to cope with the demands of food security and climate change.
That’s the demand from the British Society of Plant Breeders (BSPB), which says that applied crop research has been chronically underfunded but global issues mean that it is now attracting renewed interest.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Defra Secretary Hilary Benn and Government chief scientist Professor John Beddington have all spoken about the importance of plant breeding to adapt crops to meet the challenges ahead.
BSPB chairman Dr Thomas Jolliffe said: “Earlier this year, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn highlighted the importance of plant breeding in helping agriculture adapt to climate change.
“He also asked whether the agricultural sector – Government, industry, levy bodies, food chain – was investing enough to meet future priorities and to apply existing knowledge and the science.
“In relation to UK crop science and plant breeding, the answer is no – and this situation must be reversed as a matter of urgency.
“Put simply, there is a serious imbalance between funding of basic plant science, in which the UK remains a world leader, and support for translating the outputs of that research into relevant crop species and varieties of benefit to UK agriculture.”
Improved understanding of plant genetics and breeding methods has boosted scientists’ abilities to develop crops with greater yields and better climate resistance.
However, the BSPB said that the investment needed to continue this work is far greater than commercial growers can afford without funding.
It has put together an R&D Working Group, which will work for better collaboration between the public and private sectors.
Dr Jolliffe said: “The modest and relatively inelastic income from seed royalties limits commercial plant breeders’ ability to invest in more speculative or long-term targets.
“Because of this, the market-based approach to financing near-market and applied R&D is not working, and opportunities to exploit major advances in our understanding of plant science are being lost.
“Significant investment in publicly-funded translational crop science and pre-breeding programmes is required to ensure public benefit – for example in the form of higher yielding, more climate resilient crop varieties – can be derived from current taxpayer investment in basic scientific research.
“Commercial plant breeding is the only route to market for such improvements, and the role of plant breeders will be pivotal for further exploitation of material developed or characterised through such activities.”