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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Crispr

Pairwise Gets Greenlight from USDA for CRISPR-Engineered Mustard Greens

While health benefits of mustard greens have long been known, the strong bitter taste and pungent smell has kept this leafy green from going as mainstream as lettuce or kale.

But that could change soon. That’s because CRISPR-focused produce startup Pairwise got approval in mid-August from the USDA for their gene-edited version of Brassica juncea, more commonly known as mustard greens.

According to a release sent to The Spoon, the USDA sent confirmation to Pairwise in mid-August that the company was approved to move forward with their new take on a leafy green that has not been on many menu due to a pungent smell and bitter taste. With changes engineered by CRISPR technologies, Pairwise hopes to create a nutritious alternative to kale and Brussels sprouts that also tastes good.

Pairwise Greens in the field

According to Pairwise, their new mustard greens will feature a strong nutrition profile with supple leaves that hold up well to salad dressings and toppings and will have green and deep purple colors.

When I interviewed Pairwise CEO Tom Adams a month ago, he told me one of the reasons the company focused on mustard greens was the high yield of the crop.

Mustard greens “look just like lettuce, they they feel like lettuce, so if we could eliminate that flavor and make them taste like lettuce that they that they would be like lettuce,” said Adams. “It turns out they actually have another attribute, which is they yield on an acre basis. They yield about three times as much as kale.”

According to Pairwise, they currently have five varieties of the gene-edited produce in field trials. They have plans to expand the field trials in a few months to include the edited product and will provide sample products to partners this fall.

How CRISPR Could Create Produce That Lasts Longer, Tastes Better, and Won’t Make Pickers Bleed

Pairwise is one of the companies making a name for itself developing new types of products using CRISPR. The company is developing consumer-facing brands of produce that offer unique characteristics created through the use of CRISPR toolsets.

I caught up the CEO of Pairwise, Tom Adams, to discuss what the company is working on and to get his thoughts on how CRISPR will change the food system. Below are some excerpts from my interview. Spoon Plus subscribers can watch the interview and read the full, unedited transcript.

What are some examples of these types of CRISPR products with direct consumer benefits?

So a product that we’re interested in, sort of it’s a longer term product, is to create a cherry without a pit. You can imagine being able to just pop a cherry in your mouth and really enjoy that healthy, healthy fruit. Cherries are in season right now. They’re great, but I keep ending up with purple fingers from eating them all. I’d love to be able to just pop them over my mouth and eat them like grape. So that’s the kind of thing where we’re taking it down the barrier so that a consumer can really enjoy the cherry differently.

Now we’ll do other things that help with the overall production system. One of our ideas with cherries is to make it so you can produce cherries year round like we’ve done through 60 years of breeding with blueberries. We now have blueberries every day and I didn’t use to get blueberries every day but now I do.

How could CRISPR could accelerate the development of new forms of produce compared with traditional cross-breeding of crops?

There actually is a pitless plum that somebody isolated a few years ago. It’s not a good tasting plum, so it’s not a variety that sold. But you can cross plums and cherries, and you get chums or clerries or something. It’s not a cherry or a plum anymore. The Bing cherry was bred in 1880 and Bing cherry since then is a clone of that original tree. So if you cross them, that’s not a Bing cherry anymore.

You want to get back to the Bing cherry, you’d cross the chum back to the cherry probably 7 or 8 or 9 times until you get a little bit more cherry genome in it each time until you’re almost cherry again. That’s probably 150 years from now you’d have a pitless cherry. But with gene editing, I know what the mutation is that really resulted in the loss of the pits, so I can just go directly into the cherry and make that mutation. It’s the same endpoint that I would have gotten to through the breeding. It’s just 150 years faster.

One thing you’re working on is berries. Can you tell us more?

The blackberries I buy in the grocery store, I could take or leave. And that’s because they’re the variety that had some mutations in it that allow it to be more productive through the season. This mutation just happens to be in a variety that just doesn’t taste good. It’s very high acid. It’s not a really great berry. So we’re taking berries that taste like the ones in the Northwest and we’re putting in the same mutations that you’d see on the bad tasting ones that allow for higher productivity, and adding those to the really good tasting one. And then, just for good measure, we’re also going to get rid of the seeds. It turns out that 85% of people don’t really like the seeds in blackberries from our research. And it’s a fairly straightforward path to do that and then remove the thorns as well, so pickers aren’t bleeding.

What impact could CRISPR have on food in a decade?

10 years from now, what I’d like to picture is a lot of produce that not just that has gene editing in it, but is actually more approachable for people. We all grow up being told and taught that we should eat lots of fruits and vegetables, but only 9% of people in the United States eat the recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables. And given 5% are vegetarians, that doesn’t speak real well for the rest of us. So I want to see a variety of things that are more approachable for people.

You mentioned food waste. I think there’s an opportunity to make a substantial difference in shelf life. So when I go into a convenience store, it’s not a choice between a hot dog and a rotten banana. I can get a bowl of berries or something healthy like that as a snack and or pitless cherries. So that’s really our vision is to create a whole different marketplace of foods that fit people’s lifestyles. We eat a lot more food through snacking today than we did 50 years ago and we need to match our food up with that.

To watch the full interview of our interview with Tom Adams or to read the full transcript, just subscribe to Spoon Plus. 

Food Tech News: CRISPR Blackberries and a New Nordic FoodTech Fund

Are you baking bread this weekend? (Hot tip: Even if you can’t find yeast at the store, there’s a simple way to make your own at home.)

In between your dough prooves is a great time to catch up on your latest dose of food tech news. This week we’ve got stories on fresh varietals of gene-edited berries, a new Nordic FoodTech VC fund, Burger King’s trouble over its plant-based burger ads in the UK, and more.

Pairwise partners to breed new type of berries
Agriculture and biotech company Pairwise forged a partnership with Plant Sciences Inc (PSI) this week to create new types of berries (via WRAL TechWire). Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Pairwise uses CRISPR gene editing to develop new varietals of food that are optimized for nutrition, have longer shelf lives or grow more quickly. First up, Pairwise and PSI will focus on black and red raspberries, as well as blackberries. They’re hoping to have their first round of berries on shelves within the next few years.

Lyft launches delivery program for orgs affected by COVID-19
Rideshare and last-mile logistics company Lyft launched a new COVID-19-related initiative this week. Essential Deliveries is a program that partners with businesses and nonprofits to help them deliver staple goods like groceries, prepared meals, and cleaning and medical supplies (h/t Techcrunch) to consumers. Partners can tap into Lyft’s platform to set up deliveries or schedule rides. The program will be available in at least 11 cities nationwide and drivers will be alerted about the nature of the goods they’re delivering. All deliveries will be contact-free.

Nordic FoodTech VC launches with €24.55 million
Nordic FoodTech VC, a new venture fund targeting early-stage tech companies making the food system more sustainable and nutritious, has launched this week. The fund will begin investing with €24.55 million ($26.7 million USD) in capital. It’s the first fund in the Nordic countries and plans to invest in “dozens” of companies innovating to improve the global food system.

Burger King’s Rebel Whopper (Photo: Burger King)

Burger King’s plant-based Whopper ads banned in UK
Three ads from Burger King in the UK promoting its Rebel Whopper have now been banned by the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority. Burger King launched the Rebel Whopper, which features a plant-based burger from Unilever-owned Vegetarian Butcher, back in January 2020. Since then, complaints came in stating that the ad was misleading consumers by suggesting that it could be eaten by vegetarians, vegans, and people with egg allergies, despite the fact that it’s cooked on the same grill as meat products and features mayonnaise. The ASA has sided with the complaints, stating that the small print at the bottom of BK’s ads stating that the Rebel Whopper is cooked alongside meat products was not sufficiently in informing consumers.

SpaceX is Flying Coffee and Hemp Plants into Outer Space

Will coffee beans grown in the endless expanse of outer space taste any different? We’ll soon find out.

Colorado-based agricultural company Front Range Biosciences is partnering with SpaceCells USA Inc. and BioServe Space Technologies to send plant tissue culture from coffee and hemp up into Outer Space next year. The 480 samples will be packed aboard a March 2020 SpaceX cargo flight and remain in space for 30 days.

According to a press release, the purpose of this inter-space journey is to see how the cultures will (or won’t) mutate in zero-gravity aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Scientists will track whether any mutations will stick once the plants are brought back down to earth.

This will be one of the first times that a company gathers data on the effects of space travel on hemp and coffee cell cultures. Through the experiment, Front Range Biosciences hopes to learn more about how plants can adapt to climate change.

Coffee especially is a temperamental crop and threatened by more extreme weather conditions, like rising temperatures and drought, caused by climate change. To combat that companies are experimenting with new techniques to create more resistant coffee crops, from CRISPR gene editing to, apparently, space mutations.

The Colorado company may be the first to do concrete data on hemp and coffee plants in outer space, but Front Range Biosciences is far from the first company to launch food into zero-gravity conditions. Earlier this year Dubai startup Space Roasters claimed it would create optimal java by roasting beans in space, but now its website is an unrelated roasting blog, so I’m guessing that… didn’t work out. Japan’s Space Food X has an entire initiative figuring out how to feed people in zero gravity. And just last month a dozen bottles of Bordeaux were sent to the ISS for twelve months of intergalactic aging.

It’s still early days in the field of space agricultural experimentation, and Front Range Biosciences is just beginning its intergalactic plant tissue tests. But I for one can’t wait to sample a cup of joe made from interstellar beans. Far out.

Amid Potato Shortages, People are Worried about French Fries. Could CRISPR Help?

If you’re a french fry lover (guilty), you may have had a mild panic attack this week when news broke that a potato shortage could affect spud supplies. Unusually cold weather in the U.S. and Canada ruined some potato crops, leading to concerns that diminished supply and high demand could lead to a price spike in ‘taters — and a scarcity of french fries.

You don’t need to start stockpiling fries just yet. The New York Times walked back these tater-related fears, noting that consumers “probably shouldn’t worry so much,” and that their french fry suppliers would likely be able to keep up with demand.

This isn’t an isolated incident. With climate change making weather all the more extreme and unpredictable, it’s likely many crops — potatoes and otherwise — will be affected.

One potential solution could be gene editing technologies like CRISPR. Scientists can use these technologies to manipulate the DNA of plants to make them have higher yields and be more resilient to extreme weather conditions. Gene editing is also faster, more accurate, and cheaper than using genetically modified organisms (GMO’s).

If you think that sounds like science fiction… well, it does. But gene editing technology could also be the answer to keeping us in our favorite foods even as populations rise and ocean temperatures rise.

Scientists are already using it to shore up staple crops against the threat of climate change. Yield10, an agriculture bioscience company is developing gene edited seeds for, among other things, potatoes. Companies are also developing new strains of staples like rice and corn that are drought resistant and produce more yield even under harsh weather conditions.

Gene editing can also help non-edible foods become edible; recently scientists figured out how to tweak cotton seeds to make them safe to eat (they’re naturally poisonous).

Similar to GMO’s, gene editing foods, including those made with CRISPR, can be pretty controversial. But as climate change worsens and soil conditions deteriorate, we’ll need to harness a wide variety of agricultural technologies — like gene editing, AI, and maybe even vertical farming — if we want to keep french fries on the menu. That seems reason enough to keep an open mind towards gene editing.

Thanks to Gene Editing, Cotton (Yes, Cotton) Could Be a New Protein Staple

Odds are, you come into contact with cotton every day, in your clothes, your bedsheets, and even your coffee filters.

Soon the “Fabric of Our Lives” might be on your plates, too. Well, sort of. This month the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) declared a genetically engineered form of cotton, developed by Keerti Rathore, a professor of plant biotechnology at Texas A&M University, officially safe to eat. The gene editing only affects the seeds of the plant, not the fluffy stuff used to make your t-shirts, pants, and socks.

Seeds are often used as a source of protein or fat — think sunflower, pumpkin, etc. — but cotton seeds contain gossypol, a chemical that’s harmful to humans. Food companies have already developed a process to remove the chemical from pressed cottonseed oil, which is currently sold in various food products and vegetable oil mixes. However, Rathore’s process, called “RNA interference,” shuts off the gossypol gene in cotton seeds so people can safely eat them in their whole form. It also keeps the gossypol in the rest of the cotton plant, where it acts as a natural pest deterrent.

Since cotton is relatively plentiful, Rathore told Reuters that he hopes that the seeds could be an affordable, nutrient-rich source of protein when added to products like granola, breads or energy bars. Cottonseed meal (what remains after the seeds have been pressed for oil) could also be used to feed fish, pigs and other animals, all of which are also sensitive to gossypol.

However, it’ll be a while before humans (or fish) get a chance to sample these new gene-edited cotton seeds. Rathore hasn’t given an exact timeline, but he told the New Food Economy he first has to license out his technology to seed companies, which can then sell to farmers.

According to Rathore, the impact from adding cotton seeds to the food system could be significant. “There are approximately 10.8 trillion grams of protein locked up in the annual global output of cottonseed,” he told Reuters. “This is enough to meet the basic protein requirements of over 500 million people at a rate of 50 grams of protein per person per day.” Since many of the world’s cotton-producing countries, specifically in African and Asia, struggle with malnutrition, that protein could make a real difference.

The cotton seeds aren’t the first FDA-approved gene-edited food. Earlier this year biotech company Calyxt began selling a gene-edited soybean oil that doesn’t require trans fats for shelf stability. Yield10 Biosciences is developing genetically engineered corn kernels to produce greater outputs. We’ve also been eating FDA-approved genetically modified foods (GMO’s) for decades, especially corn and soy.

Like GMO’s, gene editing foods — including those made using CRISPR — carry a fair bit of controversy. However, the potential benefits are significant. The new gossypol-free cotton seeds give a glimpse into how gene editing can impact our food system. As climate change and deteriorating soil conditions make it harder to cultivate certain crops, gene editing technology could not only save some of our favorite foods — like coffee and chocolate — but could also help us open the door to entirely new protein sources. Throw in a population set to hit roughly 10 billion by 2050, and these sources could be critical to helping us feed a hungry world.

The Food Tech Show: How Will CRISPR Change Food?

Like life, the food we eat is a series of tradeoffs. Whether it’s that banana we buy at the local grocer or that cup of joe we drink at the corner coffee shop, chances are we are not eating or drinking the tastiest or most nutritious variety of the food but instead that which was able to last the longest in transit or is the most disease resistant.

But what if we could have the best of both worlds?

That’s the promise of CRISPR, a new technology that is essentially a form of genetic scissors allows scientists to “edit” DNA gene sequences. Imagine taking out the bad parts of a food’s DNA gene sequence while adding in or changing parts that help make it taste better or last longer.

That’s what scientists are already doing with CRISPR and gene editing techniques.

To discuss this topic, I caught up with the Pete Rowe, the CEO of Deepbranch Biotechnology, for the latest episode of the Food Tech Show podcast.

Rowe, a molecular microbiologist by training, gave the example of avocados as a food that could benefit from CRISPR and gene editing techniques. “Let’s say the best tasting avocados also happen to be the ones that bruise the easiest,” said Rowe. “So you had extremely tasty avocados that you couldn’t ship around the world and therefore they weren’t suited for live scale agriculture. But if you were to make a specific genetic change so that the flavor benefits you get, but you also retain the conventional longevity of this avocado on the shelf.”

But it’s not just helping food last longer, but also helping food survive as a crop.

“Think about all of these problems people are having with coffee,” said Rowe. “Coffee rust is a kinda of fungus that infects coffee plants. There’ s a big genetic component with that. if you make one genetic change within the coffee plant, the likelihood is, if you know what that change has to be, that you can stop that fungus infecting the coffee.

Whether it’s improving flavor, making food more nutritious, or helping it grow faster by speeding up the breeding process, CRISPR and genetic editing hold significant potential.  Rowe does a good job not only explaining these potential applications, but also explains CRISPR in language non scientists like myself (and probably most of our listeners) can understand.

To listen to Rowe talk CRISPR, you can listen to the latest episode of the Food Tech Show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, download direct to your device, or just click play below.

GM-No? Yield10 Bioscience is Developing Gene-Edited Corn for Increased Yields

Most of us have heard the oft-quoted U.N. statistic that in order to feed a growing global population in 2050, we’ll have to double food production. That’s a daunting challenge.

Some hold up genetically modified (GM) and genetically engineered (GE) crops as the answer to the impending food crisis. By changing the DNA of a crop, scientists can make them resistant to pests, weeds, and drought. In short: they can reduce harvest losses and preserve yield.

Yield10 Bioscience, an agricultural bioscience company, claims that it is developing crops that will not only reduce crop losses but will actively boost yield potential, allowing farmers to grow more plants with fewer inputs (e.g. fertilizer).

The Woburn, MA-based company grew out of a renewable bioplastics company, which began applying its tech in crop science before shifting its focus in 2015 to focus solely on new ways to engineer higher-yield crops resistant to common pests and weeds. “We started using our technology to answer the question: How do we make crops more efficient?” Yield10’s CEO Dr. Oliver Peoples told me over the phone.

The answer: genetic editing (you’ve probably heard of CRISPR, a gene editing technology).

Companies like Yield10 are basically trying to do what farmers have been doing since the dawn of agriculture: breed crops for more desirable outcomes, like sweeter fruit or bigger yields. Only instead of selecting the best crops from each harvest over years and years, they’re going straight to the source. “We’re like a genetic app developer,” explained Peoples.

Once Yield10 develops an app — er, seed — it plans to license the technology to large seed companies like Bayer/Monsanto and others to bring them to market. Peoples didn’t disclose prices, but said that the business model is to make money both from licensing the original product and get a percentage of revenue from the partners’ sales to farmers.

Yield10 hasn’t actually brought any of its seeds to market yet. Last month, the company announced that it is developing a new breed of corn that’s drought resistant and will produce larger yields. It expects the seed will be ready for field testing in 2020.

The vast majority of all corn grown in the U.S. is genetically modified.

Though Peoples and I started out discussing Yield10’s technology, we quickly went down the rabbit hole of varied public perception of genetically modified foods. A significant number of Americans think that GM foods are worse for our health — roughly 49 percent, according to the Pew Research Center. This despite the fact that U.S. regulatory bodies have unequivocally declared that genetically modified foods are safe to eat.

The question of whether GMO crops are “good” for us and our planet is a sticky one. On one hand, genetically modified crops that are inherently resistant to weeds and pests mean that farmers can use less fertilizer and pesticides, which translates fewer chemicals washed into local water sources. On the other hand, relying on only a few super-seeds means less biodiversity, which is critical for soil health. Plus the GE crop market is controlled by mega-corporations like Bayer-Monsanto, who don’t exactly have the best ethical or environmental track record.

Regardless of how you feel about GM foods, odds are, you’re already eating them. The FDA reported that in 2012, GE soybeans accounted for 93 percent of all soybeans planted, and GE corn accounted for 88 percent of corn planted, most of which was used for animal feed. And it doesn’t seem like farmers are going to stop using genetically modified crops anytime soon.

Peoples isn’t the only one trying to change our tune about genetically engineered foods. Just last month, a nonprofit of pro-GMO farmers launched Ethos Chocolate, a line of chocolate bars out to convince people that GMO’s weren’t evil — in fact, they might be the best way to save beloved ingredients like cacao, oranges, and apples.

Down the road, Peoples is optimistic that GMOs will follow the same trajectory as vaccines: At first people were skeptical, but eventually they became accepted as safe and, in fact, necessary.

“GMO traits benefit the farmer,” said Peoples. “It’s difficult for consumers who live in cities and have never really seen a farm. They don’t recognize it.” Maybe it’s up to farmers themselves to change the minds of the half of Americans who don’t want genetically modified foods on their plates.

CRISPR is Coming to Our Plates

A new technique is sneaking in our lives, potentially changing the foods we eat every day. From growing resilient crops, to boosting flavor to tackling allergens like gluten, gene-edited food brings to the table a new opportunity to improve health and pleasure, as well as fight climate change. And, most importantly, many scientists say they’re working only with nature’s own tools. Given the impressive change this could potentially bring to our farms, supermarkets and tables, let’s explore how gene-editing could change the world, and the challenging questions we should be asking.  

On March 28, 2018, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) with the guidance of the US Food and Drug Agency (FDA) made a big step, saying certain gene-edited plants can be designed, cultivated, and sold free from regulation. Going more into detail, biotechnology regulations state that USDA does not regulate or have any plans to regulate plants that could otherwise have been developed through traditional breeding techniques as long as they are not plant pests or developed using plant pests. This includes a set of new techniques that are increasingly being used by plant breeders to produce new plant varieties that are indistinguishable from those developed through traditional breeding methods. Among them, CRISPR.

CRISPR is a kind of molecular scissors that scientists can use to change or delete DNA sequences. The tool has been best known for its potential to prevent disease and fight cancer. But now it is being used to improve corn, wheat, rice, mushrooms, and other products. It could lead to hardier, more plentiful crops and tastier, cheaper, more nutritious food. Could CRISPR merely be a faster way of achieving what farmers have long accomplished with traditional techniques, such as seed selection, cross-breeding or mutagenesis? Probably, yes. But it’s not just this.

The possible applications are countless, from reducing food waste, water, and land usage to providing healthier fats to consumers. Some companies plan to use the popular new technology to give fruits and vegetables a longer shelf life. If successful, this could help prevent the sort of waste that comes from people tossing out vegetables and fruits deemed to be damaged or old. Each year, consumers throw away an estimated 400 million pounds of bruised and brown potatoes. The volume of waste grows substantially when you consider all of the other things we eat.

Scientists at Calyxt, a subsidiary of the French pharmaceutical firm Cellectis, developed a soybean by “turning off” the genes responsible for the trans fats in soybean oil. Compared with the conventional version, Calyxt says, oil made from this soybean boasts far more “healthy” fats and far less of the fats that raise bad cholesterol. Pennsylvania State University has developed mushrooms that do not brown, and the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has created tomatoes suited for shorter growing seasons. Meanwhile, other universities around the country are working on plants that will withstand droughts, diseases and the ravages of climate change. Such improvements, underway in crops as diverse as oranges, wine grapes, and cacao, could protect these plants in the future while cutting down water and chemical use, experts say.

The upsides are, therefore, quite impressive. We can imagine a not-so-distant future where new resilient crops help feed the global population, farms can overcome challenges of climate change, and we enjoy nutritious food that can prevent and fight disease.

But wait a minute, are we talking about GMOs?

The short answer is no. The difference between genetically modified organisms and gene-edited crops is the fact that the latter do not contain foreign genetic material and were not made using the bacteria or viruses that scientists employed in the first-generation GMOs. In the US, the way they are regulated is different, indeed. The FDA made a sharp separation between the two cases, saying that its authority extends only to earlier genetically modified organisms methods because it’s charged with protecting plants from infections and pests. Different is the situation in Europe, where in late July, the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) came to the opposite conclusion, ruling that gene-edited crops should adhere to the same strict regulations as genetically modified organisms.

Are there proven risks?

According to the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, there is no evidence of adverse health effects directly attributable to consumption of foods derived from gene-edited crops. Studies with animals and research on the chemical composition of genetically engineered (GE) foods currently on the market reveal no differences that would implicate a higher risk to human health and safety than from eating their non-GE counterparts.

The same goes for the environment. The use of insect-resistant or herbicide-resistant crops did not reduce the overall diversity of plant and insect life on farms. However, the complex nature of assessing long-term environmental changes often made it difficult to reach definitive conclusions.

But just like with GMOs, many argue that consumers deserve a mandatory regulatory process And this is not just for scientific reasons, but for consumer and public safety and confidence.

So, why does everybody seem concerned about gene editing our food?

Lack of background knowledge, a general aversion to ingesting technological products, as well as poor labeling are primary concerns.

Most of us don’t think about it, but almost all American-grown corn and soybeans come from genetically modified seed. Wheel your cart around a supermarket, and you’ll push past aisles of GMO foods, such as bread, cereals, and crackers, as well as yogurt, milk and meat. Even cheese is made from genetically engineered rennet — the enzyme that curdles milk — instead of traditional rennet from animal stomachs.

Finally, labeling is a crucial topic. In 2016, the U.S. Congress passed a law requiring food producers to label GMOs on their food products, but those rules may not apply to new GE foods. For example, Calyxt has actually labeled its soybean oil as “non-GMO,” stating that it contains no foreign genetic material.

Unlike older genetic modification methods, the new techniques are precise, fast and inexpensive, and companies hope they will avoid the negative reputation and regulatory hurdles that hobbled the first generation of genetically modified foods. But the speed of change has startled consumer and environmental groups who say the new technology has not been adequately vetted, and they have raised alarms over labeling and petitioned regulators to add further safety reviews.

“This is hard stuff,” Federico Tripodi, Calyxt’s chief executive, told The Washington Post. “Consumers accept that technology is good in many aspects of their lives, but technology and food have been something scary. We need to figure out how to engage in that conversation.”

Crispr Gene Editing Software May Dramatically Change Our Food — And Soon

Last week, the USDA ruled that organisms gene-edited by Crispr technology will not be subject to the same regulations as genetically modified organisms (GMO). US Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue said that the USDA currently does not, and has no plans to, regulate plants or animals “that could otherwise have been developed through traditional breeding techniques.” In other words, Crispr-edited organisms are just as safe to eat as traditional ones.

If you don’t know about Crispr, it’s a buzzy new technology that allows scientists to delete, add, or modify genetic sequences with an organism, be that a plant, a turkey, or even a human. As you might expect, it has huge implications for the food system. Crispr technology can transform genetic codes to make crops or animals grow more quickly, taste better, or be more resistant to disease and harsh environments.

Genetic modification (as in GMO’s), by contrast, involves adding genes from organisms like bacteria into crops order to change plants’ properties. The differences may seem pretty minimal, but not to the USDA; Crispr-edited organisms are subject to much less regulation than GMO’s, which have to be approved by the FDA, the EPA, and the USDA before they’re allowed on shelves.

 

Source: Agri-Pulse

This is because the USDA views gene-editing with Crispr as a sped-up version of selected breeding. So instead of humans slowly selecting and growing only the juiciest apples over decades and decades, eventually creating an extra-juicy varietal, scientists can just do this in one go by editing the genome of the apple itself.

The U.S. isn’t the first one to be lenient on gene-editing technology. In 2017 Germany and Sweden ruled that gene-edited plants were distinct from GMO, and therefore should not be subject to the same regulation. Which gives scientists working on Crispr technology a lot of freedom to manipulate crops and meat animals, at least compared to those developing GMO’s.

So what does this mean for you and your dinner plate? To start with, Crispr will enable biotech companies to develop a whole slew of modified foodstuffs. Think wheat suitable for people with celiac disease, like they’re making at the Institute for Sustainable Agriculture in Spain. Or pigs and cows that grow more quickly and with fewer health problems, which they’re developing at the U.K. livestock company Genus Breeding.

Proponents claim that Crispr technology will be used to make food more nutritious, more resistant to adverse environmental conditions, and taste better. Anti-GMO advocates, however, aren’t so keen on the new technology. They view Crispr as just another form of genetic modification; which, to be fair, it technically is — just one that’s more efficient and effective than traditional GMO processes, and which doesn’t require a transplant from another organism.

As our environment degrades and it becomes harder to produce food, CRISPR could also hold the answer to feeding our population (which the UN projects will grow to almost 10 billion by 2050). By allowing scientists to create plants that are resistant to drought, increased temperatures, and poor soil, it could theoretically help increase crop yields despite the challenges of climate change. It could also extend products’ shelf life, reducing food waste from spoilage.

If this all sounds remote and unrealistically futuristic, it’s not; Crispr-edited foods could be in supermarkets sooner than you think. Ozy.com reported that DuPont Pioneer is currently creating a strain of Crispr-edited corn that they claim could be ready for planting as early as 2019. Genus also hopes to have their meat from their quick-growing cows and pigs on supermarket shelves in 5 years. So you might be able to purchase Crispr-edited pork chops and ears of corn by as early as 2023.

The USDA hasn’t yet decided if they will require companies to inform consumers which of their foods have been edited with Crispr, which they currently do for GMO’s. But stay tuned; they’re expected to release a decision by July. No matter which way they go, their recent decision not to submit Crispr to the same regulation as GMO’s means that they’re giving enormous freedom to gene-editing technology. We’ll have to wait and see if it lives up to the hype.