b'PLANT BREEDING INNOVATIONDRIVES SUCCESS IN SEEDJuan Kiekebusch, senior biotechnology and plant breeding innovation coordinator for the Seed Association of the Americas, talks about the beauty of new tools driving innovation in the industry.Seed World (SW): How didis just developing the first commercial you get involved in working inproducts and is being used in a wide biotechnology?range of breeding programs (wide in Juan Kiekebusch (JK): Being researchterm of species, countries, and institu-head of a seed company in Latintions/companies). Gene editing can America, I was able to observe theevolve as a technological breakthrough advances in the development of biotech- as hybridization was in the past, thus this nology, basically GMOs, in the headquar- technology is a big step forward for PBI.ters of the company. When requesting to include Argentina in the Bt GMOSW: Are there any challenges you development program for corn, the keysee for the seed sector concerning condition to do so was that the countrybiotechnology in the future of the had to have a functional official biosafetyAmericas?regulation. This was our first challengeJK: The technological challenges are with the authorities which was attained inalways there, but they will overcome with 1991, from there onwards we were able toa lot of work and without major problems. push the development of Bt corn, start- The big challenge is the acceptance by ing in Argentina. society, not so much in the Americas, but yes in the rest of the world. Education, SW: Whats one of your favoritecommunication, and transparency are parts about working in the realmkey elements for the acceptance of PBI, of plant breeding innovation andpermit in 1991 and also obtained the firsthere the whole value chain has to work biotechnology?commercial Bt corn approval in Latintogether with common and agreed mes-JK: Plant breeding innovation (PBI) isAmerica (1998). These approvals openedsages. First efforts in this direction are the key to success in the seed business.completely new business opportuni- under way, but still there is a long path to Having some advantage in the seed qual- ties for the seed business. Later on, wewalk.ity offered is as, or even more impor- also obtained in Brazil, the first approval tant than intellectual property, thus weworldwide of an event that controls effi- SW: What are you hoping to have to offer constant innovation to ourciently Spodoptera sp. (FAW) and whichfocus on within the next few years customers. Biotechnology tools, such asis present in many hybrids from severalconcerning biotechnology and PBI gene editing, gives us the possibility tomultinational seed companies.at SAA?boost innovation. This is the beauty ofJK: Basically, it is to focus on the chal-the job. SW: How do you find new plantlenges mentioned in the preceding breeding technologies received inquestion. We have to work with many SW: I heard you also helped bring BtSouth America? stakeholders along the value chain corn to South America. How did thatJK: In general, these technologies weretogether with those representing our process go? well received in South America. Theseed industry, pursuing the acceptance of JK: As mentioned before, after the crea- increase of productivity by the farmerthese new technologies worldwide. Our tion of the National Biosafety Committeeusing GMOs was such that the adoptionregion has many food/feed exporting (CONABIA) in Argentina, we appliedof these technologies was very fast, incountries, thus acceptance by the ROW for Bt corn research permits. My teamfew years adoption reached over 90%.is important and we can support these obtained the first Bt corn researchIn the case of gene editing, the industryobjective.SW14/ SEEDWORLD.COMLATAM'