Roundup Ready 1 rarity in this year's seed lineup

Monday, March 5, 2012

by DON STONEMAN

The patent has expired on the original Roundup Ready soybean seed, launched by Monsanto 15 years ago, and growers are free to buy it in 2012 and save it for next year. The tricky part might be finding a company that will sell you that seed.

"Most have transitioned to Roundup Ready 2 because that is what growers want," says Trish Jordan, spokesperson for Monsanto Canada, which won't be selling Roundup Ready 1 anymore.

SeCan has had no original Roundup Ready seed in its lineup "for a couple of years and stopped research into them before that," says Martin Harry, the company's eastern marketing manager. Neither does Agris Co-operative, based in the Chatham area, says seed specialist Scott Vandehogen. Country Farm Seeds has no RR 1 varieties in its lineup this year either, says Paul Warriner, manager of product development and sales.

Colin Smith, seed agronomy advisor for Winfield Solutions, which markets the Land O'Lakes brand, says it has offered two RR 1 varieties to its distribution network in 2012, but got few takers. The industry is afraid that farmers will go back to planting bin run seed, Smith says. "There's no dollar flow back to do research."

The wheat industry has the same problem, he adds. It is very tough to get improvement in wheat varieties. He points to Western Canada, where a huge acreage of wheat is grown, but there is only one cereal breeding program. "It is small and run by the federal government. It is supported by tax dollars."

Smith says that "farmers as a whole appreciate getting new and better varieties. As consumers, none of us want to personally pay for it."

Pride has converted over to RR 2 technology, says Dave Den Boer, its manager of product development and agronomy. "We think it's better technology and (produces) better yields," says Den Boer. "We believe in it."

Monsanto's Jordan says companies had the option of contracting with growers themselves, so that the growers would not save or re-use seed. Monsanto outlined this option in a letter to growers last September.

However, users of Pioneer seed will have to do that. There are a number of ways that Pioneer ensures that growers use its seed once, says Lisa Jenkins, marketing manager for eastern Canada. Some of the Roundup Ready 1 seed Pioneer sells also has that company's own patented technologies.

Syngenta has some RR 1 seed for sale, says Shawn Brenneman, sales manager for eastern Canada. One variety in particular also has an aphid management component which Brenneman says Syngenta feels "brings value" to the customer. Syngenta is working to add that technology to newer seed platforms.

Brenneman says growers don't have to sign an agreement not to save the seed on the variety that is strictly Roundup Ready 1.

Seed companies are introducing a number of new varieties to Ontario growers this year. A list of those varieties is on Better Farming's website at www.betterfarming.com. The list is searchable by growing area and by trait.

Seed distributors listed on the 2011 Ontario Soybean Variety Trials report from the Ontario Oil & Protein Seed Crop Committee were asked to submit new varieties to this list. The expected yields are the opinion of the distributor of the varieties. The trial report can be found at www.GoSoy.ca  BF