Sowing organic agriculture’s future with better seed stock

Organic farming requires organic seeds. While this sounds relatively straightforward, organic seeds are expensive, difficult to source, carry a higher risk of seed-borne diseases, and can be contaminated by their non-organic counterparts.

The ECOBREED (Increasing the efficiency and competitiveness of organic crop breeding) project’s ambition is to prevent bottlenecks such as this hindering growth of the organic market. It aims to improve the availability of suitable seeds and varieties, identify traits with the highest potential, and increase breeding activities for organic and low-input crop production.

The project kicked off in May 2018, pursuing seven objectives: identifying suitable traits and variations; evaluating the potential of genetic variation to enhance nutrient acquisition; increasing weed competitiveness and control; developing better participatory breeding systems; pre-breeding ‘elite’ varieties; and organising training programmes.The initial phase of the project was dedicated to the identification, selection, evaluation and multiplication of genotypes to allow for further studies and field trials. The latter specifically focused on four crop species: wheat, potato, soybean and buckwheat. According to Vladimir Meglič, coordinator of the project and researcher at the Agricultural Institute of Slovenia, the ultimate objective is to ensure that the new varieties of organic crops have the same yield per hectare as conventional ones. The team identified promising crosses for specific traits such as drought tolerance, resistance to pathologies and nutritional value.

The field trials took place in several different countries. In Slovenia, the Agricultural Institute ran tests on organic potatoes, seeking to improve seed tuber quality and vigour through the use of cover crops. Phosphorus uptake efficiency trials focusing on buckwheat took place in Slovenia and the United States, while experiments in Serbia focused on the negative economic impact of the southern green shield bug on European soybean production.Project partners also ran three trials specific to durum wheat, with Tuscia University in Italy leading the charge. A total of 72 durum wheat lines were evaluated during the first year of the project, on Italian, Austrian and Bulgarian fields. The experiments resulted in cross-selections with higher productivity than already commercialised crops.

“Completely switching to organic production would be impossible because organic food is still a niche market, and because many organic farmers simply wouldn’t survive without subsidies at this stage,” Meglič told a Slovenian newspaper in 2018. “What we can do and are already doing with ECOBREED, however, is to try and find new approaches and technologies to reduce manual work, eliminate weed and provide disease-resistant varieties to organic farmers.”

The project is expected to conclude in early 2024.