29th September 2022 By Contributor | contact@foodticker.co.nz | @foodtickernz
You haven’t heard of the NZ Immuno-apple, or avocados that don’t overripen, or our climate-friendly happy animals yet? Instead of waiting a couple of years, KPMG‘s Jack Keeys offers a vision of a biotech-enabled future as soon as 2024.
LinkedIn Post, 12th June 2024
Absolutely stoked to see the Biotechnology Aotearoa Alliance (BAA) have officially launched the NZ Biotech brand at the opening of Fieldays this week!
If you missed it, BAA is a partnership between the Food and Fibre sector, Crown Research Institutes, and Fit for a Better World.
The NZ Biotech brand is already being called ‘revolutionary’ across the international headlines.
The Chief Brand Guardian of BAA actually summarised the world-leading aspects of this initiative really well, and explained some of the added benefits too:
Key to the brand is that the NZ Biotech label requires any genetic engineering in New Zealand to adhere to the four commitment principles:
They were quoted saying “For a long time, people assumed gene editing technologies would only be used to increase yield and remain in a commodity cycle.
However, with modern precision biotechnology – we’re able to unlock significant value-add opportunities through enhancing the genetics inherent in our plants and animals”.
Some of the NZ Biotech products already under development are a nutritionally enhanced “immuno apple” that has double the vitamins of traditional varieties and an avocado cultivar that pauses ripening (linked with ethylene production) at optimum eating condition.
In our animal production, genetics for 25% reduced methane, parasite-resistance, mastitis prevention and temperature tolerance have been identified across sheep, beef, dairy, and deer breeds; this will now rank them as the highest in the world on the global ‘production animal health and happiness index’.
Some of the advanced bioactive extraction and nutraceutical ingredients from native flora are looking very promising too.
It’s really exciting that the BAA initiative has not only given the food and fibre sector a giant leap into more resilient and environmentally friendly systems, but it’s providing the opportunity for ultra-premium products at the same time.
One of those difficult points was the initial concerns from the organics sector, so bringing the sector into the BAA initiative as a partner to ensure security of organic producers was another key element for success.
A NZ Biotech Organic label is already being considered as a sub-brand due to the anticipated increase in pest and disease resistance without the use of sprays, or compromising animal welfare, quality and yield.
Because the partners of BAA took this leap – which we can all agree took some bravery and was a little contentious at the time – New Zealand’s now positioned itself as a world-leader in biotechnology.
How brilliant to see that there are already a dozen new scientific strategic partnerships between our research Institutes and centres of biotech excellence around the world, and we’ve seen 1000 scientists immigrate here as part of the science innovation visa in 2024 so far.
It was published that boosting our science output is forecast to deliver a new biotech IP export industry, which comes packaged with the NZ biotech brand and benefits. What an awesome way to leverage and scale the impact of New Zealand’s breakthroughs so we can help to feed 500 million people rather than 50 million – we just won’t be growing it all on our own shores.
Some forecasters are actually expecting the export and royalty revenue of these biotech packages to exceed income from sale of physical products as early as 2035.
I’d definitely call myself a conservationist, so the news that BAA has already started its possum, stoat and rat eradication programme and is forecast to take Aotearoa to Predator Free status by 2047, three years ahead of schedule is beyond exciting too.
I have to give huge credit to those who were willing to make the brave decisions over the past 18 months to bring this together. A big piece of that was lifting our R&D spending by government and industry to match (but hopefully in the future – exceed) OECD average.
By aligning with our core values shared across the country, we’ve enabled a true step-change for the sector.
It’s hugely rewarding to know that New Zealand will remain leaders in the food and fibre sector for many years to come.
And in case you’re wondering, I heard that, yes – BAA was a play on NZ being so widely recognised for our sheep!
Jack Keeys is an agri-food research and insights analyst at KPMG in New Zealand.
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