Of the top 10 food crops in the world, potato comes in at the third place, and is also the number one non-grain food product. Originally grown in the Andes, the Spanish introduced the potato to Europe in the 16th century, and, after a bumpy start, po… Read More
The attention span of a goldfish is nine seconds, whereas recent research shows that humans lose their capabilities to focus in eight seconds. For those of you whose attention span is a little longer that eight seconds you will have noted that we are… Read More
European policy making has had a great, but not always positive impact on European agriculture and the seed sector. We only need to recall the process of approving GMOs, new plant protection products, or the recent ban on neonics, just to name a few.… Read More
Farm animals can’t do without plant proteins. As a source of amino acids for livestock, they are an essential component of animal feed. The EU is raising the ambition on growing more protein crops, although agro-climatic conditions are such that ou… Read More
EU decision making Various European institutions are involved in decision-making at EU level. The most important bodies are: The European Parliament, representing the EU’s citizens and is directly elected by them The European Council, consisting of… Read More
With the expansion of cities and the disappearance of agricultural lands, I often wonder how rural the EU still is. Well, according to the EU Commission, it appears that around 85% of the EU’s territory is classified as rural (48% is farm land … Read More
To learn more about how seed companies are experiencing the new UPOV-PRISMA application tool, European Seedspoke with Astrid Schenkeveld, Specialist Variety Registration & Protection at Rijk Zwaan, and Jan Knol, Plant Variety Protection Officer a… Read More
Let’s say you just created a wonderful new variety after 10 years of crossing and selection, and now you want to protect the variety through plant breeders’ rights in a large number of countries. Until recently you had to search for the different… Read More
A legal analysis of case number C-528/16 on mutagenesis in plants In December 2014, nine French NGOs initiated legal proceedings against an Article of the French Environmental Code, which implements the EU GMO Directive. They argued that plant variet… Read More
Plant breeders on average spend between 12 to 15% of their turnover back into research and development, which is considerably higher than many other industry sectors. Just to give you some figures for comparison, Bloomberg data from 2015 stated that … Read More
