Apr 15, 2011

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GM potatoes: Release, approval and cultivation

At the forefront: Tailor-made starch potatoes

Since March 2010 a genetically modified (GM-) potato, for which the starch composition has been optimised for industrial purposes, may be cultivated in the European Union. GM-potatoes have been tested in field trials in many EU countries for nearly two decades. The aim has been primarily a modified starch composition. Most of the field trials were carried out in Germany and the Netherlands.

The potato accounts for the largest number of deliberate release trials in the European Union after maize and rape. By April 2011, 299 potato trials had been authorised, mainly in Germany (76), the Netherlands (65) and Britain (42).

Novel traits

As far as potatoes are concerned, research institutes and companies are mainly interested in modifying the starch composition and other components. This is reflected in the deliberate release trials: more than half of all approved applications relate to field tests for potatoes with a genetically modified carbohydrate metabolism.

In this respect potatoes differ significantly from other plant species. Whilst genetically modified resistance to herbicides, pests or pathogens predominate in maize, rape and sugar beet, these traits are of secondary importance in potatoes, at least in Europe.

A few projects are concerned with genetically modified defence strategies to combat a persistent plant disease which is feared by many farmers: the fungus Phytophthora infestans, the pathogen for late potato blight. Applications have been made for deliberate release trials of fungus-resistant potatoes in 2006 in Sweden, the Netherlands, Britain, Germany and Ireland.

Trials in Germany

In 1993 the first genetically modified potatoes were released in Lower Saxony in Germany. These first GM potatoes already had modified carbohydrate metabolism. More than two-thirds of the trials approved so far have involved field trials with potatoes with modified starch composition and new plant substances.

In the framework of biosafety research, potatoes with modified constituents as model plants were tested in field trials. From 2001 until 2004, the cultivation characteristics and possible effects on the environment were investigated of a potato that produced not only starch, but also fructans, dietary fibres with a health-promoting effect.

From 2005 until 2008, one research group was working on a potato that enriched the carotinoid zeaxanthin in its tubers; zeaxanthin is meant to provide protection against age-related blindness.

In a current research project, field trials will be carried out from 2008 to 2011 on genetically modified potatoes that produce cyanophycin in their tubers from which a biologically degradable polymer can be obtained.

Approvals and cultivation in the EU

In March 2010, the EU granted approval to the genetically modified potato “Amflora” for the cultivation and processing to animal feed. Although this potato is exclusively intended as a raw material for the starch industry, part of the waste material from the processing is to be recycled as fodder. This potato developed by BASF Plant Science yields exclusively amylopectins – starches that are better suited for many industrial purposes than normal potato starches.

Worldwide

Four genetically modified potato varieties have been approved for cultivation and use as a foodstuff in the USA and Canada. As a result of a transferred gene, all four produce an antibody (Bt protein) to combat the widespread Colorado potato beetle. Two of them are also resistant to viruses which cause plant diseases (potyvirus Y; leaf roll virus PLRV). The first GM potatoes were planted in 1996. Over the following years, the cultivation area in the USA rose to 25,000 hectares. This cultivation was suspended in 2001.

In Australia, Japan, Korea, in the Philipines and Mexico GM potaoes have been approved only for use as a foodstuff not for cultivation.