Indonesia, the world’s second-largest importer of wheat, has approved the marketing of this drought-tolerant cereal variety, HB4, both as animal feed and for human consumption. It was approved for “feed” last year; now has “food and feed” approval.
The Indonesian food safety authorities published the approval this Tuesday and the fact has a strong impact on our country’s cereal market because that Southeast Asian country is also the second largest buyer of Argentine wheat: 21.3 % of wheat exports in 2020 went to Indonesia.
Furthermore, the approval of this genetically modified wheat variety was endorsed by the three instances of the prestigious Argentine regulatory system (Conabia, INASE and the Ministry of Agriculture) but for two years its marketing was suspended ad referemdum from the approval of Brazil , the main customer of the baked cereal produced in the pampas.
On the 3rd of this month, the South American giant approved the cultivation, production and marketing of HB4 wheat. It was the second country, after Argentina, to allow the planting of this type of grain. Together, they are responsible for 90% of the area planted with wheat in Latin America.
This step was taken after a long and rigorous review process by CTNBio, an institution of the Brazilian government responsible for analyzing the activities of Genetically Modified Organisms, transgenic and derivatives, and arrived just over a year after the approval of the import of HB4 Wheat flour into that country, carried out in November 2021.
In this context, at the end of February Bioceres presented the evaluations of the yield of HB4 wheat in Argentina. In one of the most complex contexts of the last 30 years, following severe drought and late frosts, the results were convincing: on average, the yield of HB4 wheat was 22% higher than the type of grain of this superior cereal used in our country and has been shown to have a potential of up to 40%, depending on the environment.
HB4 wheat, as well as soy with the same characteristics, was developed by the Bioceres company, through the research of the scientist Raquel Chan, Conicet and the Universidad del Litoral. The world’s leading biotechnological discovery consisted in the introgression of a sunflower gene, a species that adapts better to drought periods such as the current ones.
From 2019 to the present, HB4 technology has rapidly advanced its regulatory status globally.
The Indonesian announcement is part of a progressive endorsement by some of the main soybean and wheat importing and producing countries that already use this type of wheat, enhancing it every time in a context of drought, heat and climate change.
Source: Clarin
