Health Canada to issue decision on gene edited crops

Date:12-10-2021

By Robert Arnason

Health Canada is expected, likely today, to publish guidance on how gene-edited crops will be regulated.

It appears the department will treat gene edited crops differently from genetically modified (transgenic) crops, which means the oversight of gene edited crops could be closer to conventionally bred crops.

Gene editing is often described as adding, removing or altering genetic sequences at precise locations in the genetic code.

It’s different from transgenic plant technology, where DNA from another species, such as a bacteria, is inserted to achieve a desired trait.

The best known gene editing tool is CRISPR-Cas9, a technique used to cut sections of DNA. Scientists from California and France won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery of CRISPR.

If Health Canada does regulate gene edited crops the same as conventional plant breeding, it would represent a win for the plant science industry and possibly Canadian farmers.

Supporters of gene-edited crops, including many plant breeders, believe it could revolutionize crop development. It will allow scientists to quickly and precisely change a plant’s DNA to achieved desired traits, maybe to improve disease resistance in wheat or to design a canola hybrid with healthier oil in the seed.

The Health Canada guidance on gene-edited crops is part of a larger department effort to modernize plant breeding regulations. Gene editing is the crucial piece that ag industry reps and environmental groups are watching because of the implications for plant breeding innovation and how products will be regulated.

Health Canada requires pre-market safety assessments for GM crops that can add millions or tens of millions of dollars to the cost of getting a variety to market.

However, a gene edited plant may not trigger regulation or an assessment. Oversight could be more like a conventionally bred crop.

The Canadian Biotechnology Action Network, in a release issued yesterday morning, criticized Health Canada and its position on gene editing before the department issued its position on the matter.

“Under new regulatory guidance, Health Canada is removing its authority to regulate many new genetically modified foods developed with gene editing techniques … and leave safety assessments to product developers instead,” CBAN said.

The organization and a number of other groups sent a letter sent to agriculture minister Marie-Claude Bibeau and health minister Jean-Yves Duclos, asking the government to pause the decision on gene edited crops.

“We oppose the proposals from Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) that would allow many gene-edited genetically engineered foods and seeds onto the market with no government oversight,” the letter says.

CBAN may believe that gene editing is a method to produce genetically modified crops, but many scientists have a different opinion. Most describe gene editing as another plant breeding tool, which allows scientists to precisely and quickly achieve their breeding goals.

If Health Canada decides to treat gene edited crops more like conventionally bred crops, it would build upon a previous decision.

In March, the department said gene edited crops are safe.

“Through a review of the current scientific knowledge regarding the use of gene editing technologies … Health Canada concludes that the use of gene editing technologies does not present any unique safety concerns compared to other methods of plant breeding.”

That position puts Canada on the same footing as other countries, such as the United States, Japan, Australia and Argentina, which have decided that gene edited crops are safe.

American crop science companies have already moved forward with gene editing because the U.S. government provided clarity on the technology.

In March 2018, U.S. agriculture secretary Sonny Perdue said gene-edited crops will be treated similarly to conventional plant breeding and will be largely exempt from regulation. That has allowed American innovators and plant breeders to get a head start with gene edited crops.

As an example, a Minnesota firm has used gene editing to design a soybean that produces high-oleic oil. The company produced four million bushels of the crop in the U.S. in 2020.