Solutions for Impact in Emerging

Markets: The role of biotechnology

Pooja Bhatnagar-Mathur

p.bhatnagar@cgiar.org

Seed Security for Food Security Forum- a 2017 Borlaug Dialogue Side Event,

World Food Prize 2017, Des Moines, October 17, 2017

This presentation

• ICRISAT’s mission

• Constraints to crop productivity

• Biotechnology for crop improvement

Global efforts & status

• Biotech traits @ ICRISAT

• Newer approaches for old problems

• Issues linked to the development & deployment of GE crops

• Overcoming the challenges

• Conclusions

We believe all people have a right to nutritious food and better livelihoodsICRISAT works in the dryland tropics of sub-Saharan Africa and Asia to:

Our research activities are focused on crops of immense value to the nutrition and economics of the semi-arid tropics – dryland cereals (sorghum, millets) and grain legumes (chickpea, pigeonpea and groundnut).

ICRISAT - Our “Why”

Vision: A prosperous, food-secure and resilient dryland tropics

High levels of poverty, malnutrition and environmental degradation

Covers 6.5 million sq. km.

Across 55 countries

with 2 billion people

of which 644 million are the poorest of the poor

Semi-Arid Tropics: Home to Most Emerging Economies

1. Crop improvement a major challenge.

2. Limited variability in the available germplasm.

3. Available germplasm may lack genes for major disease, pest resistance, and nutritional traits.

4. Lack of information on the nutritional and food processing traits.

5. Future breakthroughs will depend on creating additional variability, and inflow of desirable genes from related or unrelated species through biotechnology.

Constraints to crop improvement

Global Area of Biotech Crops, 2016: By Country

(Million Hectares)

• Top five countries: 3 Developing countries (Brazil, Argentina, & India)

and 2 Industrial countries (USA & Canada) grew 91% of biotech crops

Agriculture and Economic Sustainability

• Reduce need for external inputs

• Soil and water conservation

• Improved food distribution

systems, less wastage

• Crop improvement strategies that

integrate the best of conventional

and modern to optimize

productivity

Multiple Interventions • <5% suitable agricultural land in production

• Only 4% land in production is irrigated (30% in South Asia)

• Low fertiliser use/high depletion of soil nutrients

• Agricultural productivity at 25% of global average

• Growing population

• Shorter transitional

seasons, replaced by

characteristically hot and

dry; or hot and wet.

• Stagnating agricultural

productivity

• Rapid Urbanization; Rise of

industrial belts

• Persistent malnutrition

1951 2001 2050

90%

Declining per capita availability of land Unrealised agricultural potential

Crop- Target Region Genes/Technology

Cowpea Africa Insect resistance

Banana Africa Bacterial wilt, Vitamin A

Cassava Africa Virus resistance

Maize Africa Drought

Potato SEA Disease resistance

Mustard SA Hybrid vigor

Eggplant SA Insect resistance

Silk Moths SA NPV Resistance

Important Traits for sustainable agriculture

Global Examples

Developing Technologies for “Breeding demands”

+Biological interpretations based on “DATA”

High throughput genetic

transformation systems.

Transgenic trait development

Functional gene validations for

key traits

Systematic mutant populations

for accelerated genetic gains.

Translational Research for

transgenic product development

& deployment.

Expanding the breeders’ toolbox @ ICRISAT

• Biotechnological tools and technologies for research towards product development.

• Combine forward and reverse genetic and biological engineering approaches to understand basic genetic and molecular mechanisms that control plant processes & stress responses (From predictive to descriptive biology).

• Integrate discovery research with emerging ethical, legal and societal issues to responsibly mature innovative plant biotechnology solutions.

Complementary and interconnected axes

Breaching genetic glass ceilings to overcome

intractable traits in our focus crops

Efficient Transformation Systems: Legumes

Peanut

Pigeonpea

Chickpea

Efficient Transformation System: Sorghum

Crop/Constraint Genes/Technology

Peanut

Viruses PBNV N-gene; Antisense/RNAi

TSV/PSND Coat Protein

Fungi Aflatoxin Rice chitinase; 13Lox; Ms Def1, MtDef4, amy, nsdc, P2C; HIGS

Abiotic Stress Drought rd29A:DREB1A

Bio-fortification ß-carotene oleo:psy1/ß-lyc; crtB, crtI

Pigeonpea/Chickpea

Insect Pod borer cry1Ac; cry2A; cry1Ac-1F; cry1Ac-2Aa

Abiotic Stress Drought rd29A:DREB1A; 35S:P5CSF129A

Bio-fortification ß-carotene oleo:psy1; crtBI; oleo:lyc-psy

Herbicide tolerance HT GmCYP; HtCYP

Sorghum

Insect Stem borer 35S:cry1Ac; 35S:cry1Ac-1F

Enhanced sugar Sugar ceiling PdSI

Priority traits for transgenic interventions @ ICRISAT

Insect resistance in Pigeonpea & Chickpea

Control

Pod bioassay

+ve sample

UT Control

Pod damage

Untransformed controls

Transgenic Events (T3-T5)

Pod bioassays

Strategies to address VAD

•Dietary diversification

•Supplementation

•Fortification

•Biofortification

The Golden Crops

• β-carotene levels increased up to 25-folds in the first

generation transgenic events carrying psy1 gene

• The second generation transgenic events carrying the

Zmpsy1 and Le β-lycopene cyclase gene showed 100-folds

increase in β-carotene levels

5.5 µg/gm

Pro-vitamin A enrichment in peanut

Transgenic events that ranged from very similar to very different from controls were further tested

JL24

RD19

RD20

RD2

RD11

RD12

Transgenic Drought Tolerance

Peanut and Chickpea

Y=T*TE*HI (Passioura, 1977)

Finally…… It’s all about Yield !!

**

*

* **

*

; RD33RD2

Relative change in seed yield over WT 18-26% increased yield under drought stress

Aflatoxin- a complex issue

Synergistic interaction with Hepatitis-B

& C

Malnutrition

Liver cancer

Trade Restrictions

Quality reduction

Aflatoxin contamination in food and feed

Vicious-Link

Reduced ability to cope with diseases,

especially HIV/AIDS

Liver cirrhosis, immuno-suppression, blocks nutrient absorption,

growth abnormalities, etc.

Trade Health

In many SAT countries, monitoring and weak enforcement of

food safety standards

Host plant

resistance

Field level assessments &

Implementation across regions & environments

Knowledge on fungal biology

genetics & management

Efficient pre-

harvest

phenotyping/

screening methods

Plant

breeding

strategies

Exploring non-

host

resistance?

Biocontrol

strategies

Transgenics

Overexpression

of antifungal /

anti-toxin genes

Proteomics

Candidate

genes/ RAPs/

RIPs

Molecular

markers

Marker assisted

selection

TILLING/

Mutagenesis

HIGS/

RNAi

Source: IITA

Bio Control-Competitive “atoxigenic” fungal technology

Sporulation on moist soil

3-20 days

Spores

Wind

Soil colonization and displacement of toxigenic fungi

Broadcast

Colony growth, pigmentation, and sclerotium

production and reduced conidiation in A. flavus

ΔnsdC and ΔnsdD mutants

Aflatoxin resistance strategies in peanut

Candidate genes for HIGS

Aflatoxin biosynthetic cluster genes

A. flavus α-amylase, Pectinases

Global Transcription factors and co- activators

Sharma et al. (2017), Plant Biotechnol. J.

Double Defence Strategy

WT HIGS

Peanuts that keep aflatoxin at bay: thresholds matter

Over 20 million hectares (ha) of crop land in sub-Saharan Africa is Striga-infested, resulting in a whopping $ 1 billion in annual yield loss (CIMMYT)

Annual crop losses of over $1.3 to 2.6 billion; 2.6 million ha of solanaceous crops in the Mediterranean, North Africa, and Asia

Menace of parasitic weeds

Types of resistances 1. Germination **

2. Attachment

3. Post attachment-

haustoria formation

Bewitches cereal production systems

SL receptors; genes responsible for Striga germination ; Using mutants/ HIGS/ genome editing methods for inducing variations

No more free lunch !!

Yang et al., 2016, PNASToh et al., 2016, Science

Gene silencing

Germination, attachment and post-attachment connections

Transient knock-down of PaCCD7 and PaCCD8 inhibited

tubercle development and the infestation process in host

plantsAly et al., (2014) Plant Signaling and Behaviour

Functional Gene Discovery Platforms

Developing genetic and genomic resources that can enable efficient gene discovery and

mining for crop improvement.

Systematic mutagenized TILLING population in Sorghum; Tnt1 insertional mutant lines in chickpea and

pigeonpea generated for random insertions to develop resources for efficient forward- and reverse-

genetics studies *.

Traits :

Sorghum- Improved grain yield and adaptation, leaf architecture and plant maturity, Striga resistance.

Chickpea- Plant architecture, Seed size and quality

Pigeonpea- Seed yield and quality traits

The next big thing!!

Customized Genome editing platforms for expanding Breeder’s tool box

Natural and induced variations

“Data”

Identifying new targets (genes/proteins/metabolites)

Functional validation

Targeted genome scale engineering

Identifying relevant network & pathways

Linking to phenotype

Intractable traits being

studied:

• Groundnut- Aflatoxin

• Sorghum – Striga

• Pearl millet- Rancidity

• Pigeonpea- Photoperiod sensitivity

• Chickpea- Dry Root Rot

Systems for Efficient Traits and Genetic Gain Optimizations

Translational research

T0’s Event Selection (GH) Event Selection (Fld) Regulatory Release

GroundnutGRAVPBNV

Pigeonpea &Chickpea

Bt

GroundnutA, flavus

Pigeonpea & Groundnutß-carotene

1-2 years 2-3 years 2-4 years 2-4 years 3-6

Translational Activities

ChickpeaDREB

GroundnutDREBPigeonpea

&Chickpea Bt

New Tools•HIGS•Proteomics

• Failure to translate concepts into commercial products

• Barriers of IP/Trade

• Biosafety regulations/Food safety

• Risk assessment and risk management

• Training & Capacity building

• Partnerships for product development & deployment

• Commercialization limitations, a serious barrier

Bottlenecks in Translational Research

A public sector perspective

• Promoting innovation & technology transfer

• Synergy & strength of social equity of

public institutions and efficiency of delivery

of the private sector.

• Create linkages in the supply chain to

deliver inputs to small-holder farmers at

reasonable costs.

• Investment costs are shared leading to

lower product costs (= benefit to consumer).

• Risk Management and Mitigation.

Public-Private partnerships are the key

• On what cropping systems do the poor most depend?

• What are the constraints to the productivity of those

systems?

• What existing or potential technologies might best

address those constraints? Under what scenarios?

• What is the magnitude and distribution of potential

payoffs to the poor from different investment targeting

strategies? e.g., target ecologies, production systems, crops,

constraints, technologies..

Strategic Questions

Value Chains and Country Strategies

Crop improvement

Inputs and farmer services Post-harvest handling and access to markets

Research and development

DiscoveryAgronomic

researchOther input

systems

Farmmanagement

Seed systems

Knowledge exchange

Aggregation, quality and storage

End-user demand

Processing

Value Chain Approach Guides our Country Strategies

• To establish clear priorities

• To help identifying specific areas or technology trajectories to invest, and meet specified goals by optimal

utilization of available skills and resources

• Consider IPR and impact on the acquisition, development, and diffusion of biotechnology; forge strategic alliances

Participatory approach and partnering

Building capacity

Integrating communications

Monitoring and evaluation

Policy support

Priority Setting

Issues &

opportunities

Research Innovations

Trait Development

Tech Transfer

PPP

Promoting

MarketsTechnological

and

institutional changes

Research-- technology development -- technology transfer -- technology use

Building iterative relationships

Principles1.Create and charter an entity with express purpose of translating genetic

engineering research into a practical, value adding technology

2.The entity would embody the requisite scientific and business skills that are appropriately balanced

Mission

To translate transgenic technology and harness its

products to meet the needs of agricultural growth

Platform for Translational Research on Transgenic Crops

An ICRISAT-DBT Initiative

(PTTC)

• To develop and deploy state-of-the-art

infrastructure for conduct of transgenic research.

• To act as a clearinghouse for technology inputs,

transgenic research leads/ prototypes with proof of

concept derived from Indian research institutes,

universities, and other likely sources.

• To “evolve” the technology to a point where a

practical application can be demonstrated, and

transfer this “evolved” technology for product

development and distribution to appropriate

agencies.

Platform for Translational Research on Transgenic Crops (PTTC)

An ICRISAT-DBT Initiative

• Scientific & technical support

• Access to bio-tech infrastructure

• Knowledge services

• Partnerships

• Start-up mentoring

• Business & Market development

• Grant & fund facilitation

• Start-up training program

• Legal & IPR

Bio-Incubator

PTTC

AIP-ICRISAT

Ag-bio Start-up MarketICRISAT

BioNEST Bio-Incubator @ ICRISAT

Outcome

• Start-up growth

• Ag-bio promotion

• Funding and M&As

• New products in market

• High-end IPs

Incubation to Translation

Incubation

Graduation/Tenant

1-3 years

Incubation experience & Clientele pipeline

Translation experience & Technology support

To address disconnect between the proof-of-concept, technology

development, technology translation, and commercialization

Benefits to Public Sector Tech Transfer

• Public sector technology developers find an outlet for their

technologies.

• Small & Medium seed companies have access to products of

biotechnologies.

• Technologies available to the stakeholders (resource-poor

farmers) at an affordable cost.

• Products developed in the PTTC can be easily transferred to

the participating countries and need only to be evaluated for

their local agronomic performance.

Biotechnology is a valuable tool in eliminating global hunger, poverty and

malnutrition!

It is a strategic weapon in winning the next Green Revolution!

Let us harness biotechnology with due regards for the farmer, consumer and

environment

Thank you