By Sabine Vollmer


Corn and soybean plants are plentiful in the BASF greenhouses in Research
Triangle Park near Durham, N.C., where scientists generate and test crops
whose genes have been altered to adapt to difficult climates or to pack more
nutrients.


Among the pots are also a few sprouting rice and wheat plants.

That's unusual. Genetically modified crops have been around for more than
two decades. But companies that tinker with plant genes tend to focus on
crops that have long been bred for desirable traits. Genetically modified
corn, soybeans, canola and cotton seeds, including varieties that can
tolerate herbicides or are resistant to pests, are widely used by U.S.
farmers to produce more food, feed and fibers on the same-size fields.

Rice and wheat are fairly new to gene modification because farmers and
consumers have been less accepting of artificial changes to those food
crops. But BASF, a German chemical giant that came late to agricultural
biotechnology, has begun to branch out. Its executives think that those
preferences are changing and that the demand will increase as populations
grow and acreage stays the same or shrinks.

Much of the work is done at its U.S. plant science research hub in RTP where
its scientists have been working in food research longer.

"With rice, we are to the point where we're very heavily investing in field
trials," said Jonathan Bryant, managing director of BASF's plant science
business in the U.S. "And we're seeing success."

Research into genetically modified wheat is just beginning. BASF is
considering plants such as switchgrass and trees for biofuel production,
Bryant said.

In the United States, Latin America and parts of Asia, farmers and consumers
are becoming accustomed to genetically modified crops. And as farmers seek
to increase their yield per acre with limited acreage for crops, sales of
biotech seeds are expected to more than double to $15 billion in 2015.

Competition for market share is fierce. Right now nobody sells more
genetically modified seeds than St. Louis-based Monsanto, which has 95
percent of the market. But Syngenta, DuPont's Pioneer, Bayer CropScience and
Dow Agrosciences all are trying to claim a bigger piece of the pie.

In an effort to retain its dominance, Monsanto two years ago turned to BASF.
The companies plan to invest $1.5 billion over the next two decades to bring
new genetically modified crops to market. The collaboration is supported by
the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The fruits of that collaboration are ripening at the RTP facility that BASF
opened in 1999. BASF and Monsanto are investigating hundreds of plant genes
to come up with seeds that produce hardier, more productive corn, soybean,
cotton and canola plants. The most advanced products are being tested in
large field trials, said Stephen Evola, director of BASF's plant science
research. By 2012, Monsanto hopes to sell the first genetically modified
corn seeds generated by its collaboration with BASF.

www.checkbiotech.org