Just a stone’s throw from a sleepy suburb outside Zurich, barley is being grown under tight security. Because it’s not ordinary barley – it’s a genetically modified variety that’s challenging science and the need to boost food production, and challenging opponents of genetically modified crops.
The “Golden Promise” variety is the star of the first field trial in Switzerland with a crop whose genes were edited using the CRISPR/Cas9 gene scissors.
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In the case of the Swiss barley trial, the aim is to CKX2 Gene that regulates seed formation using CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing. Japanese researchers have already successfully used this method to increase rice yield. Scientists at the Swiss agricultural institute Agroscope, in collaboration with the Free University of Berlin, hope to achieve similar results with barley.
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However, in March 2023, the Swiss Parliament instructed the federal government to prepare a draft law for consultation that would introduce a risk-based approval system for plants and seeds developed using CRISPR technology. This provides an exception to the GMO ban and allows experiments with genetically modified plants that do not contain foreign genes and offer added value for agriculture, the environment and consumers. The draft law is expected to be submitted by the federal government for consultation in the second half of the year, probably in September.
This is an excerpt. The original article can be found here
