THE COMMERICAL cultivation of genetically modified wheat is moving closer to reality after Trigall Australia received approval for field trials of the Argentinian-developed HB4 variety.

The Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care – Office of the Gene Technology Regulator (OGTR) on August 15 approved the licence application, which will permit the GM wheat to be grown at 10 sites per year with a maximum area across all sites of 20ha.

The trial sites may be in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia or Western Australia.

According to the application, the aim of the trial is to “gather research and regulatory data for the GM wheat under Australian growing conditions, including under environmental stress”.

The GM wheat grown in the field trial will not be used for human food or animal feed.

The regulator ultimately found the “risks to the health and safety of people or the environment” from the proposal was “negligible”.

The HB4 technology is already permitted to be sold or used in food and feed products after Food Standards Australia New Zealand approved an application made by Trigall in May 2022.

This is the first time a non-educational institution has progressed a trial licence to grow a GM wheat in Australia.

The OGTR has previously approved trial licences for GM wheat for the University of Adelaide in April 2024 and February 2022, the University of Melbourne in April 2019, and CSIRO in July 2018.

Currently the only GM crops approved for commercial cultivation in Australia are: cotton; canola; Indian mustard; banana, and safflower.

Founded in 2022, Trigall Australia is owned by Trigall Genetics, a joint venture of Bioceres Crop Solutions and Florimond Desprez, and S&W Seed Company.

In recent years, Bioceres has signalled this is the first step in its ultimate goal of seeing GM wheat grown commercially in Australia.

Bioceres is leading the commercialisation of HB4, which it claims is the “world’s only drought-tolerance technology for wheat” and that the “HB4 trait increases wheat yields by up to 20 percent”.

Bioceres executive director Federico Trucco said the field trials would provide data needed for a future commercial cultivation application.

“We received the first permit to do field trial in Australia for HB4 wheat, which is important to move forward with a breeding process, a variety conversion, technology validation, and the regulatory work that is required towards final cultivation approval,” Mr Trucco told shareholders during a conference call on Wednesday.

“It might take a few years, but that is moving forward in a predictable manner, and we already have the first permits in place to be planting HB4 wheat in that geography.”

Ahead of Australia, the United States Department of Agriculture last month approved the commercial cultivation of HB4, joining fellow American nations Argentina and Brazil.

Mr Trucco said the company will target Hard Red Wheat varieties, typically planted in the US Mid West, and mostly used for domestic consumption.

He acknowledged more work needed to be done to ensure market access for HB4 grown in the US.

He highlighted Japan and South Korea as key markets where consumption approvals would need “to be in place” before the HB4 technology could be expanded further in the US.

Australian implications

As an export-orientated commodity, limitations to market access could significantly impact the viability of GM wheat.

Outside of Australia, New Zealand and the US, only Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Nigeria, Paraguay, Indonesia, Chile and Thailand have approved HB4 wheat for food and animal feed.

Of these export destinations, Indonesia, one of Australia’s top markets, could be a potential market for HB4 wheat.

Other key export markets, such as China and Vietnam have historically been open to the prospect of GM crops.

In May, China approved safety certificates for GM wheat varieties and has recently increased permits for GM maize and soybean seeds.

However, a court ruling in The Philippines, another significant market, resulted in ban in the cultivation of GM rice and eggplant.

InterGrain gene-edited moves

A few steps behind Trigall, is Australian cereal breeding company InterGrain which, in collaboration with US seed design firm, Inari, is working to create gene edited wheat varieties.

Unlike the GM technology process which introduces new material from another plant or species into a crop, gene-editing seeks to manipulate the existing genetics in a variety.

Gene-editing is undertaken using the CRISPR technology.

Speaking at the AgriFutures evokeAg event held at Perth in February, InterGrain CEO Tress Walmsley said gene-edited varieties were growing at the University of Western Australia’s Shenton Park facility.

She said the InterGrain-Inari partnership was two years into a project to bring gene edited wheat to Australian growers.

“We have the aspiration of bringing to market wheat products that have 10 percent yield improvement for the farmers,” Ms Walmsley said.

She said the company was optimistic about the future of gene-edited crops in Australia.

“It will be an easy sell to the Australian grower.

“I think growers particularly in Australia are very open to adopting new technology and we just see that the majority of the Australian canola crop is very much imbedded with genetically modified technologies.”

Ms Walmsley also acknowledged the potential market access roadblocks raised by Bioceres.

“We do acknowledge that not all of our export destinations that we send wheat to are as progressed on their regulatory system and thinking of where gene editing sits.

“We know in advance that we are going to have to work with the grain trade industry in Australia to make sure that we don’t hit market access issues and that’s why we’re being very open and transparent about what we’re doing.

“We want the Australian industry to have no surprises when we actually launch our first product.”

In tandem with Intergrain’s work, FSANZ is also developing a new code for food produced using new breeding techniques (NBT) which don’t fit the GM label.

FSANZ had opened public consultation on its proposal that would remove food derived from NBT from having to be regulated under the GM label.