Bayer and Solynta potato partnership leverages hybrid breeding for disease-resistant crops

12 Jul 2024 --- Bayer joins forces with Solynta to use true potato seeds that will introduce new hybrid potato varieties to Kenyan and Indian markets. The agreement focuses on commercializing and distributing disease-free, high-quality starting material to smallholder farmers in these regions. The project promises robust new varieties bred to thrive in challenging conditions while benefiting smallholder farmers.

This partnership marks Bayer’s entry into the global potato market and leverages Solynta’s expertise in potato breeding to develop robust potato varieties suitable for key growing regions.

Growers can plant potatoes from true seeds rather than the traditional planting of tubers and only need 25 grams of clean and disease-free true potato seeds per hectare to start a potato crop, compared to the 2,500 kgs of perishable seed tubers previously required. 

Partnership with “significant synergies”
Bayer will utilize its distribution channels to commercialize the most suitable varieties. The new hybrid potato varieties will be distributed in the form of true seeds by Bayer to potato growers in remote areas of Kenya and India, which has the second largest production of potatoes in the world behind China.

In an in-depth interview with Food Ingredients First, Solynta’s director of strategic alliances and developments, Charles Miller, dives into the agreement.

“This is a big step for both companies as potatoes are the third largest staple crop in the world. So it’s a very big market. And it’s a market that doesn’t change that often; we’ve propagated potatoes almost the same way for over 100 years. When you look at the challenges and the bottlenecks that we’re going to face in the future, these things really do need to develop not just for potatoes but for all crops,” he says.

“When you put a company like Solynta, which has very innovative breeding techniques and a unique seed production division, together with Bayer, a company with a unique testing environment and very large distribution footprint, that creates a huge synergy.”

“This synergy will bring benefits to the growers. Ultimately, both companies want to benefit the growers, to support food security, and to, where possible, alleviate hunger and poverty.”

Unusual weather in Europe has harmed potato crops last two seasons, impacting availability of seed tubers and increasing prices.Concerns over climate 
Miller explains that the last two seasons for potato growers in Europe have been difficult due to unusual weather. This specifically impacts the availability of seed tubers which has reduced between 30% and 40%. Prices for seed tubers have also increased by 20% to 30% across the board.

“This impacts not only European farmers but also farmers globally, who depend on us in Europe to supply high-quality seed tubers. On top of that, countries like India and Kenya, which are far from Europe, face seed insecurity. Unless you have the security of high-quality seeds, food insecurity will always follow. Those are the main drivers that brought our two groups together. We have the desire to support farmer income, which in turn supports local economies, which in turn supports local food security.”

True seeds versus tubers
Miller says that growing potato crops from true potato seeds instead of seed tubers offers significant advantages to the potato industry. True potato seeds are clean and disease-free, have a long shelf life, are available year-round and are much smaller and economically efficient to transport and store.

Through hybrid breeding, true potato seeds can be bred with additional beneficial traits, including disease resistance and climate resilience. A critical component is that innovative and creative breeding techniques that are environmentally safe have the ability to “turbo-charge” solutions to growing better quality food for the future. 

“With hybrid breeding, we can shorten the timeline to create new varieties. For example, we went from a standard potato variety with no resistance to the potato fungus late blight, the biggest problem that the potato industry faces, to the same variety with multiple genes of blight resistance in 18 months. That is completely unheard of in the traditional potato industry.” 

“By using true seeds, we can scale supply to growers within 12 months, which takes six to eight years on the traditional tuber route. This gives us the ability to react much faster to a very dynamic and changing world, whether it’s population, water supply or climate.”

Cutting timelines means a faster supply of potatoes to French fry manufacturers, fresh grocers and other businesses, which shortens the value chain and helps redistribute funds along the chain more equitably. 

Resistance varieties
Late blight resistance varieties are being tested worldwide, explains Miller, who is seeing “huge improvements” in the robustness of the crop. 

“Not every season does blight occur, but it’s very difficult to manage when it does. It’s very costly because farmers need to spray every ten days. In the EU, for example, about €700 million (US$762 million) per year is spent to control this disease.”

“With these new varieties, you can dramatically reduce, if not eliminate, the need for spraying and still have high-quality, very tasty potatoes.”

By Gaynor Selby