Genetic modification could solve the problems facing potato producers who are about to lose many of the chemical weapons used to control pests and diseases in a crop that is a staple of the British diet.
Scottish Crop Research Institute potato breeder Finlay Dale told the Scottish tattie industry’s annual conference the possibilities from biotech were vast.
The reduction in the agrochemical armoury stems from European rules that have clamped down on the use of certain active chemical ingredients contained in pesticides, herbicides and insecticides as they are now deemed hazardous at even the smallest amounts.
Mr Dale said plant breeders like him had seen a transformation in the last three decades as they switched from a basic position of breeding the best with the best and then hoping for the best to one where they were using gene markers to remove some of the guesswork. The next step into GM could remove notable production faults in existing varieties. Genes that were resistant to disease could also be inserted into varieties to assist growers cutting chemical use.
Mr Dale also urged consumers to look beyond the headlines when forming an opinion of GM technology. He said the unravelling of DNA in humans and plants was now universal and he believed there would be a gradual acceptance of the benefits biotech would bring.
Stuart Wale, the Scottish Agricultural College's Aberdeen-based potato expert, said the arrival of GM was inevitable. It was not a matter of if only when. He also told the SAC-organised conference that potato growers should be changing husbandry techniques following a dramatic rise in the amount of blackleg and gangrene attacking crops.
The problem, seen in an increasing amount of tuber samples in farm stores, could be traced back to the cutting off of the crop pre-harvest.
For the last 60 years the most common method of desiccating potato crops was diluted sulphuric acid.
It has, however, been banned, a move that has forced growers to mechanically flail down the above ground plant material and then apply approved haulm desiccant.
Mr Wale said the switch to flailing appeared responsible for the rise in the two bacterial diseases that will remain in the tatties and potentially cause problems in 2010 crop. He urged growers not to flail down crops when it was raining as there was a greater spread of disease when crops were wet.
And he also advised seed producers to instal treatment applicators on potato harvesters to help protect the crop prior to it being put into store. Just 5% of seed growers use pre-store treatments.
For those producers with disease and damage in their stored potatoes, there are hopes that technology may yet come to their aid.
Lawrence Defty, of specialist machinery manufacturers Herberts of Wisbech, said new electronic cameras were likely to become available within in a year.
These would allow improved grading, particularly in seed tatties that go through the process unwashed. The hope is the cameras will allow automatic checking, so dispensing with hand grading.