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Introduction
New gene-editing technologies can help to overcome challenges in sustainable food supply. These biotechnologies enable agricultural professionals to meet an ever-growing demand for food. However, understanding of their impact is incomplete, the data required for risk assessment is only partially available and there are ethical and societal concerns. Legal systems vary between prohibition, case-to-case product risk analysis and systems based on a precautionary principle.
In addition, the impact of recent mega-mergers in the agrochemical market prompts warnings of market dominance.1 The mergers of DupontDow in the US, ChemChina-Syngenta in China and Bayer-Monsanto in Europe look set to dominate the global agricultural, chemical, seed and genetically modified (GM) food markets.
This article reflects on regional regulatory developments in light of the friction between plant variety rights versus plant patents.
Conventional plant breeding rights versus genetic engineering plant traits
Conventional breeding versus genetic engineering
Plants can be created in two different ways: through conventional breeding or genetic engineering. Conventional or 'traditional' plant breeding and genetic engineering are different in the processes that are used and the products they generate.
In conventional plant breeding, breeders develop new plant varieties by selection and crossing, seeking to achieve an expression of genetic material that is already present within a species. Conventional breeding uses processes that occur in nature, such as sexual and asexual reproduction, with the resulting plant emphasising certain characteristics. Conventional breeding increasingly makes use of biotechnological methods (excluding genetic modification).
Genetic engineering uses biotechnology to modify genetic material and create a species with a trait that does not occur naturally. Traditional genetic engineering does not occur in nature, although spontaneous mutations do happen naturally. Genetic engineering allows researchers to more precisely control the expression of certain genes and to create genetic material, the expression of which leads to new plant characteristics. A distinction is made between transgenic technology, which involves the insertion of foreign DNA into an organism's genome, and techniques such as mutagenic technology, by which mutation is induced without the introduction of foreign DNA.
Mutagenic technologies such as clustered, regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/CRISPR-associated genes and proteins (Cas) are being used at an accelerated rate to alter DNA in a living organism's genome (similar to transgenic biotechnology) and to develop new plant varieties and...