CRISPR discussed at XX Brazilian Congress of Seed Technology

Considered revolutionary for allowing gene manipulation with greater precision, quickness and at a lower cost, the Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) was a subject of the XX Brazilian Congress of Seed Technology which held in Foz do Iguacu, Brazil on August 7, during which AgroPages was present. Embrapa researcher Alexandre Nepomuceno presented the possibilities of its application and its impact on the market.

 

A huge differential in the CRISPR technology, discovered just five years ago, is that the hybrids of corn generated by the genomic edition are not considered genetically-modified at several places. This eases the release and authorization for commercialization, for instance, in countries such as the United States and Argentina.

 

“This can influence the regulations related to the technology in several countries, including Brazil. This can lead to a rapid introduction in the market of genomically edited plants that do not contain fragments of DNA from other species and/or big operations at the endogenous DNA sequence,” explained Nepomuceno.

 

The Embrapa researcher stressed that the lower production cost and the quickness of commercialization could result in a decentralization of the seed market. “When reducing the cost for the development of new cultivars, the technology allows the entry of new players into the market,” he noted. 

 

According to the expert, the new goal is “to look into strategies and adaptations developed by nature to be used in the development of plants with characteristics that are one with our interest.” 

 

Brazil and China should decide in the coming days if they will classify the crops with CRISPR as GMOs. Experts pointed out that these two countries could decide the global acceptance of this innovation.