Strengthening the Global Potato Value Chain with Hybrid Diploid True Seed

By Charles Miller, Director, Strategic Alliances & Development, Solynta

Background

The reliability of the potato value chain is critical to global food and nutritional security. That’s why the potato industry is known for constant innovation. To deliver on the global responsibility, agriculture processes, supply chain, seed science, and more are regularly reviewed and upgraded.

One such innovation is hybrid breeding, which results in true potato seeds. Solynta has been working for nearly twenty years on an innovation of breeding for hybrid diploid true seed to improve farmer and industry economics as well as sustainability.

Solynta’s true seeds are bred from diploid potatoes. Diploid potatoes have half the number of alleles (2) on each of the 12 chromosomes compared to tetraploid potatoes, making them ideal for identifying, targeting, and selecting for desired genes, such as disease resistance. Utilizing true seed allows for global dissemination of cultivars and genetic traits to advance global food and nutritional security.

Partners

Solynta, The Netherlands

Solynta manages botanical seed production and provides true potato seeds (TPS) to their partners. They work closely with their partners throughout the growing season to determine and establish the best cultivation system for their needs, based on all forms of starting material from TPS, including seedlings and tubers.

After years of extensive field-testing of their products on five continents, the technology of hybrid potato breeding has proven itself in yield, disease resistance, and climate resilience.

A small sampling of the results by partner farmers and producers spanning more than 40 countries seen across the last few years are described below.

GreenBridge, Egypt

Collaborations with crop specialist company GreenBridge in Egypt, have shown promising results from their initial large-scale trial using hybrid TPS. The trial used seedlings grown from TPS, and was conducted near El Minya, Egypt. It yielded 40 tons per hectare after 120 days, an incredibly positive result for the first regional large-scale trial.

It demonstrates the potential of TPS to reduce the reliance on imported seed tubers and avoid many of the existing supply chain issues.

 

Agris, Greece

Last year showed promising results from collaborative field trials in partnership with Agris, a vegetable seed and plant production company, across six Central European countries, including Greece, indicating a far more robust and regional capacity for producing hybrid potatoes.

Based on previous results, the activities in the region have grown considerably. Solynta provides true seed and together with their customer service agronomists and collaborating partners, they decide what to grow and develop as starting material. With locally available and resilient potato seedlings, farmers could reduce reliance on imported seed tubers.

Carlow Research Partner, Ireland

Knowing the importance of the potato to Ireland’s agricultural sector, as well as the consistent threat of late blight, field trials were conducted in Carlow, Ireland (an area known for high late blight pressure) with a research partner. Three local commercial varieties were planted next to one of Solynta’s latest hybrid varieties with enhanced resistance against late blight. There were also no pesticides applied in the field throughout the growing season.

All commercially compared varieties succumbed to foliar late blight whereas the Solynta hybrid variety displayed strong resistance and good yields (Figure 1).

More information can be found here.

Mlango Farms, Kenya

Several smallholder farms and co-ops in Kenya, including partner and customer Mlango Farms, successfully harvested and sold their first hybrid potato crops grown from Solynta TPS and completed their second harvest season.

The second season was grown from seedlings and G-1 tubers that had short dormancy, which is well suited for the double rainy seasons.

They were pleased to see that yields were higher than those typically seen by neighboring smallholder farms, thanks to the high resistance levels against late blight and consistently high-quality starting material. The hybrid potatoes were healthy, organic, and grown completely chemical-free. This was a great result for the future of hybrid potatoes in Kenya.

Lessons Learned

Potato growers all over the world can grow new hybrid potato varieties from several starting material forms, whether directly from true seeds or their seedlings or tubers.

These field trials, partner pilots, and commercial implementations with Solynta’s customers show that starting material is and can be made available for growers at stable, reasonable prices. The adoption of true seeds would drastically increase the availability of disease-free starting material.

Conclusion

These trials reflect only a small fraction of the success farmers around the world have had in their use of true potato seeds. Indeed, the use of hybrid TPS is only a small part of the solution to a more resilient potato value chain. The entire industry must have the freedom, resources, and support to trial and adopt all kinds of innovations – whichever best suits their region, farm, and sustainability/climate requirements. Solynta will continue to partner, develop climate-resilient seed and easy-to-use TPS for any and all potato growers who want to explore hybrid varieties.