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60 I EUROPEAN SEED I EUROPEAN-SEED.COM INDUSTRY NEWS integrity of the global seed trade said Jeremy Bergstrom DuPont Pioneer global quality test- ing manager. I believe further industry collab- orationcommunication using these industry memberships as a platform help influence seed testing rules and expedite the acceptance of newer more precise seed testing technologies says Bergstrom. The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation aw a rded 2.3M to the T wo Bl a de s Foundation 2Blades a charitable organ- isation that supports the development of durable disease resistance in crop plants and their deployment in agriculture. Four well-recognised research teams will inves- tigate plant immunity in the United States and Europe. Jeff Dangl University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Brian Staskawicz University of California Berkeley Jonathan Jones Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich UK and Detlef Weigel Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Tbingen Germany will lead the project at their world- class research institutions. The research teams will focus on three agricultural plant systems found worldwide Brassicas mustard greens and their relatives which are important model organisms in plant biology nightshades potatoes tomatoes and their relatives and domesticated wheat and related species. This undertaking is made possible by the key tech- nology developed in the Sainsbury Laboratory said Roger Freedman chairman of 2Blades. The aim overall is to provide fundamental information on how plants evolve to resist pathogens and ward off disease. As part of the project the teams will develop a publicly available database containing sequence infor- mation on the plant species investigated. This open-access database will help other scientists and agricultural agencies around the world improve disease resistance in plants and better help address food security. Farmers who use neonicotinoid seed coat- ings subsequently use less insecticide to con- trol pests on oilseed rape according to new research published in the Nature journal Scientific Reports. But the study also demon- strated that more honey-bee colonies were lost as the usage of imidacloprid a first generation neonicotinoid increased. The study showed for the first time that farmers who use neon- icotinoid seed coatings reduced the number of foliar insecticide sprays used to control pests on oilseed rape. Farmers using neonicotinoids also saw significant yield benefits but not in all years. Giles Budge head of Crop Science and lead author of the study said Our data indi- cate that farmers who used neonicotinoid seed coatings often had positive economic returns driven by an increase in yield but this was not always the case. We now need to understand why neonicotinoid use does not always result in increased profitability for farmers to help target appropriate use to those situations where farm- ers see the most benefit. An international research team has some good news for the honeybee and the millions of people who depend on them to pollinate crops and other plants. These valuable pollinators have faced colony losses over the past decade largely due to the spread of a predatory mite called the Varroa mite. But the bees might not be in as dire a state as it seems accord- ing to research recently published in Nature Communications. Researchers found a pop- ulation of wild bees from around Ithaca New York which is as strong today as ever despite the mites invading the region in the mid-1990s. Valued at 4.82 billion in 2014 the global seed treatment market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate CAGR of 10.8 per cent by 2020 according to a recently released report from research firm MarketsandMarkets. The Seed Treatment Market Global Trends Forecast to 2020 report said North America led the global seed treatment market in 2014 with the U.S. as a major producer. With regard to the application of seed treatment Latin America was second and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 11.1 per cent by 2020. The expected growth in the seed treatment market is tied to the increas- ing global population and food requirements rise in cost of fertilisers and pesticides and easier residue management. The leading players in the market include Syngenta AG in Switzerland Bayer CropScience AG and BASF SE both in Germany Sumitomo Chemical Co. Ltd in Japan Nufarm Ltd. in Australia and Platform Specialty Products Ltd. in the U.S. PRODUCT NEWS Marrone Bio Innovations Inc. a provider of bio-based pest management and plant health products for the agriculture turf and ornamental and water treatment markets has announced that its Grandevo bioinsecticide has received a completeness determination from the European Commission and is now cleared to begin the evaluation for Annex 1 listing and commercialisation in the European Union. A recent policy decision by the European Commission the European Food Safety Authority and a Working Group of EU Member States has allowed Grandevo to be evaluated as a microbial pesticide. Until this recent EU decision only pesticides contain- ing live microbes could be evaluated under EU regulation. Receiving this complete- ness determination for Grandevo from the Netherlands is an important step in making the potential benefits of new biopesticide products available to growers throughout the EU said Keith Pitts MBIs vice-president of Regulatory and Government Affairs. Bayer CropScience has reached an important milestone towards the market introduction of its biological insecticide Requiem in Europe. Its active ingredient Terpenoid Blend QRD 460 has been recently approved by the European Commission. For growers and the entire food value chain Requiem provides control of sucking pests and extends quality of harvested produce. First registrations of Requiem are expected in some European countries before end of 2016. Market launch in Europe is planned for 2017. Requiem is the latest innovation from Bayer CropScience in the field of biological insecticides and an important addition to integrated pest management IPM programs in greenhouse vegetables said Gilles Chevallier global product management of biological insecticides at Bayer CropScience. Its mode of action is effective against sucking pests especially thrips whiteflies aphids and mites leading to healthier crops and better-quality produce. Incotec Europe has succeeded in further reducing dust-off in the witloof chicory pellet product line. The products have been successfully marketed since January 2014 but a recent breakthrough has enabled these improvements. Adjustments in the production process including application of the finishing layer have reduced dust by 50 per cent. An added advantage is the smoother surface making the pellet easier to process. As well as reduced dust and easier processing the witloof chicory pelleting gives all the quality enhancements you can expect from seeds pelleted by Incotec. WEB AND APP NEWS EU Regulators and Food Suppliers Can Now Access Online GM Crop Database The IPAFEED database is an EU-funded MARLON project which contains searchable data for monitoring possible health impacts of genetically modified GM crops on livestock animals. The project seeks to help regulators and the food supply chain to ensure that any health risk is identified early and effectively. The MARLON project focused on bringing knowledge on GM crops in animal feed. The IPAFEED database contains information from scientific papers with detailed descriptions of each study accessible results and links to sources. The database was regularly updated throughout the project which was completed last July. Researchers have also collated information on animal health indicators. Tools and guidelines to help monitor the health of animals exposed to GM feed have been developed as well. The positive news for both regulators and European agriculture is that data collected from controlled short-term long-term and multi-generational feeding trials have revealed that no adverse health effects have been caused by GM feed on animals with some studies even detecting positive effects. httpipafeed.eu.