Page 237 - Breeding and regulatory opportunities, Renaud

General Discussion

Figure 6.1 Schematic of organic seed system models

The 100% conventional seed company indicated as Model 1 in Figure 6.1,

services the organic market with conventional post-harvest untreated seed of

a select group of specialized crops. Such companies are not motivated to breed

or produce cultivars for the organic market for the most part because they have

determined that the market size is too small and fragmented, and does not it in

their business philosophy (often being associated with chemical pest control or

GMO testing and development). The service they presently provide the organic

sector is to select high quality cultivars of typically a limited group of crops,

in conventional post-harvest chemically untreated form. As their cultivars are

not available as organic seed, they predominantly but not exclusively service

the large-scale organic growers who can obtain derogations and who desire

the speciic varieties and traits available exclusively from such seed. If seed

regulatory closure is to occur, these companies will need to determine if the

market they service would be suiciently large to deem investment in producing

seed for that market. As they have no experience in producing organic seed, lack

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