Sweet Success
The efforts of Syngenta during a crisis show its commitment to sugarbeet growers.
Imagine you have planted the same variety of a crop you have grown for the last few years. With just a month or so until harvest begins, the crop is looking good. And then, a federal judge rules that the U.S. Department of Agriculture failed to consider certain environmental and interrelated economic impacts when it first deregulated the herbicide-tolerant trait used in the variety growing in your field.
Although the judge's decision allows you to harvest that crop and your grower-owned cooperative to process it, you begin worrying about next year's crop immediately. That's because the now re-regulated trait is planted on 95 percent of the acres grown across the U.S. Fears there is not enough conventional seed to plant 1.2 million acres the following year are real.
That's the situation the U.S. sugarbeet industry found itself in on a Friday afternoon in mid-August 2010, following a federal judge's ruling that the USDA failed to consider certain environmental and interrelated economic impacts when the agency first deregulated Roundup Ready® Sugarbeets in March 2005. This decision plunged the seed back into a regulated status and threatened to devastate the industry, which supplies half of the domestic sugar. Not only was conventional seed in short supply, but the lack of labeled herbicides and hand labor needed to control weeds in a conventional sugarbeet crop were what had motivated growers to adopt the technology so quickly in the first place.
In the midst of that turmoil, Syngenta worked with the industry - from grower organizations to sugar cooperatives to other seed companies - to ensure farmers would have the freedom to operate.
Industry Advocates
The fight began in January 2008 when organic seed growers and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Oregon sued the USDA to stop commercial seed production of Roundup Ready seed varieties. As a primary supplier of Roundup Ready sugarbeet seed, Syngenta was part of a team of industry players who took the lead in defending the genetically modified seed.
"Both the industry and Syngenta saw the value of the trait and the importance to defend the technology," says Tyler Ring, head of cereals and diverse field crops product management at Syngenta. The legal team at Syngenta worked collaboratively with lawyers from the Department of Justice, Monsanto and other seed companies, and sugar cooperatives, spending countless hours to develop a strategy.
Regulatory Aspect
While attorneys argued in court, others at Syngenta developed contingency plans. When the USDA announced in February 2011 the beet industry could grow Roundup Ready sugarbeets under a partially regulated permit system while it completed its environmental impact study, Syngenta was ready.
To meet the new USDA permitting requirements, seed needed three layers of sealed containment while being shipped from the seed processing center to warehouses, re-packaged for customers and then triple-contained again for the trip to the farm. Syngenta changed some deliveries from open flat-bed trailers to contained trailers.
"We had to change several aspects of how our seed associates handled sugarbeet seed, from storage to on-farm delivery," Ring says.
Opponents of the technology underestimated the industry's ability to adapt and work with USDA to keep seed production moving forward in the interim, Miles says. "There were times when we were frustrated, but we worked through those difficult times and found solutions that met USDA requirements."
Raising Seed
When a new biotech trait is nearing commercialization, companies typically produce seed on only a limited number of acres, with production acres expanding after the necessary regulatory approvals have been obtained. But suddenly Syngenta found itself dealing with 186 sites and nearly 700 acres of regulated seed production until July 2012. That's when USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service announced Roundup Ready sugarbeets were once again completely deregulated after over two years of litigation and further study.
Ring is proud of the leadership and resources Syngenta provided during that turbulent time. "We are a science-based organization. We will continue to bring new traits and new technology to the marketplace. That's who we are," he says. "We strongly believe in our technologies and will continue to do what it takes to defend our products."
Although the judge's decision allows you to harvest that crop and your grower-owned cooperative to process it, you begin worrying about next year's crop immediately. That's because the now re-regulated trait is planted on 95 percent of the acres grown across the U.S. Fears there is not enough conventional seed to plant 1.2 million acres the following year are real.
That's the situation the U.S. sugarbeet industry found itself in on a Friday afternoon in mid-August 2010, following a federal judge's ruling that the USDA failed to consider certain environmental and interrelated economic impacts when the agency first deregulated Roundup Ready® Sugarbeets in March 2005. This decision plunged the seed back into a regulated status and threatened to devastate the industry, which supplies half of the domestic sugar. Not only was conventional seed in short supply, but the lack of labeled herbicides and hand labor needed to control weeds in a conventional sugarbeet crop were what had motivated growers to adopt the technology so quickly in the first place.
In the midst of that turmoil, Syngenta worked with the industry - from grower organizations to sugar cooperatives to other seed companies - to ensure farmers would have the freedom to operate.
Industry Advocates
The fight began in January 2008 when organic seed growers and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Oregon sued the USDA to stop commercial seed production of Roundup Ready seed varieties. As a primary supplier of Roundup Ready sugarbeet seed, Syngenta was part of a team of industry players who took the lead in defending the genetically modified seed.
"Both the industry and Syngenta saw the value of the trait and the importance to defend the technology," says Tyler Ring, head of cereals and diverse field crops product management at Syngenta. The legal team at Syngenta worked collaboratively with lawyers from the Department of Justice, Monsanto and other seed companies, and sugar cooperatives, spending countless hours to develop a strategy.
Regulatory Aspect
While attorneys argued in court, others at Syngenta developed contingency plans. When the USDA announced in February 2011 the beet industry could grow Roundup Ready sugarbeets under a partially regulated permit system while it completed its environmental impact study, Syngenta was ready.
To meet the new USDA permitting requirements, seed needed three layers of sealed containment while being shipped from the seed processing center to warehouses, re-packaged for customers and then triple-contained again for the trip to the farm. Syngenta changed some deliveries from open flat-bed trailers to contained trailers.
"We had to change several aspects of how our seed associates handled sugarbeet seed, from storage to on-farm delivery," Ring says.
As regulatory compliance manager for Syngenta, Paul Miles is used to dealing with the regulatory aspects of pre-commercial seed production. But the partial deregulation was just as new to him as it was to everyone else in the industry. The Syngenta Regulatory Compliance team developed robust protocols that were used throughout the seed production and seed distribution chains."There were times when we were frustrated, but we worked through those difficult times and found solutions that met USDA requirements."
Opponents of the technology underestimated the industry's ability to adapt and work with USDA to keep seed production moving forward in the interim, Miles says. "There were times when we were frustrated, but we worked through those difficult times and found solutions that met USDA requirements."
Raising Seed
When a new biotech trait is nearing commercialization, companies typically produce seed on only a limited number of acres, with production acres expanding after the necessary regulatory approvals have been obtained. But suddenly Syngenta found itself dealing with 186 sites and nearly 700 acres of regulated seed production until July 2012. That's when USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service announced Roundup Ready sugarbeets were once again completely deregulated after over two years of litigation and further study.
Ring is proud of the leadership and resources Syngenta provided during that turbulent time. "We are a science-based organization. We will continue to bring new traits and new technology to the marketplace. That's who we are," he says. "We strongly believe in our technologies and will continue to do what it takes to defend our products."
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