German life sciences giant Bayer believes a change to EU policy on gene-edited crops has the potential to reshape Europe’s €6bn seed market and vindicate its troubled acquisition of US rival Monsanto.
After several years of negotiation, EU institutions have agreed to relax rules that in effect banned gene-edited crops in Europe. The new policy, which requires final approval from governments and the EU parliament, divides plants into two groups.
Those with edits to the plant’s own genome, rather than with DNA inserted from another species, will be exempt from strict genetically modified organism rules. Plants of this type are already widely used in countries such as the US, Brazil and Japan. Crops with more extensive modifications remain subject to GMO rules.