“By providing this license we hope to accelerate valuable research taking place in public and non-profit research institutions to benefit the developing world.”
Monsanto’s technologies will support efforts already underway at the Danforth Center to conduct research and further develop a comprehensive global research plan to tackle the most significant challenges facing cassava farmers, including control of disease, post-harvest deterioration, and enhancing the nutritional content of the crop.
“Part of the Danforth Center’s mission is to facilitate the development and transfer of technologies for developing countries and we are pleased that we have received this license from Monsanto toward that purpose,” said Roger N. Beachy, Ph.D., President of the Danforth Center. "By granting this license, Monsanto has enabled researchers at the Danforth Center, and our collaborators around the world, to continue our important work while now freely using Monsanto technology to even further advance agricultural research on cassava, a crop that hundreds of millions of people will continue to rely upon for food security and economic development in coming decades,” he said.
Cassava, a tropical crop grown for its starchy, tuberous roots, contributes to food security and rural income in many developing countries and feeds nearly 600 million people daily. A recent report by the United Nations singled out cassava as a priority for additional research in developing countries.
The United Nations’ Human Development Report 2001 also encouraged greater public investment in research and development to ensure that biotechnology is used to meet the agricultural needs of the world's poor.
"By sharing our technology and other scientific knowledge, Monsanto hopes to encourage other companies and technology developers to do the same,” said Robb Fraley, Chief Technology Officer of Monsanto.
“Working together in public and private sector partnerships promotes a wide variety of discoveries to enhance food security and nutrition throughout the developing world. We look forward to continuing our support of the cassava research program as it develops,” said Fraley.
Monsanto also is supporting the Danforth Center’s efforts to develop virus-resistant cassava through a multi-year grant from the company’s philanthropic organization, the Monsanto Fund. Monsanto’s contributions to the Danforth Center are in keeping with the New Monsanto Pledge and its commitment to sharing knowledge and technology with public institutions to benefit people and the environment, particularly in the developing world.
In August 2000, Monsanto granted similar royalty-free licenses to the inventors of ‘golden rice,’ which is being developed to combat vitamin A deficiency in developing countries. Other sharing projects include providing access to a working draft of the rice genome and participating in work to develop virus-resistant sweet potatoes in Africa and papayas in South East Asia.
The Donald Danforth Plant Science Center is a St. Louis-based not-for-profit, basic research institution devoted to the creation of new knowledge that will lead to the sustainable production of nutritious and abundant food for the peoples of the world. For more information on the Danforth Center, see: www.danforthcenter.org.
Monsanto Company is a leading provider of agricultural solutions to growers worldwide. Monsanto's employees provide top-quality, cost-effective and integrated approaches to help farmers improve their productivity and produce better quality foods. For more information on Monsanto, see: www.monsanto.com.
Making Monsanto’s Technology Available: Sharing and Beyond
Monsanto’s commitment to share knowledge and technology with public institutions to benefit health and the environment is incorporated in the company’s New Monsanto Pledge, a series of commitments that describe the company’s policies for products developed through biotechnology. As a partner and/or contributor to the projects below, Monsanto shares fundamental scientific data; technology, including genes and traits; know-how to use technology to improve crops important for food security; guidance on environmental stewardship and information on food safety; and licenses to patented technologies – all to develop crops that produce more food, use less pesticide, and improve people’s health around the world.
ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA: Two years ago, Monsanto led a team that year discovered more than 40,000 Arabidopsis genetic markers, increasing the resolution of the genetic map used by Arabidopsis researchers approximately 50 to 100 fold. Monsanto made its markers available to the Arabidopsis Information Resource (TAIR) project, which then made the data publicly available. These markers contributed to the ability of scientists to completely sequence the Arabidopsis Thaliana genome in 2000 and are helping to advance research on other agricultural crops.
“GOLDEN” CROPS: Monsanto is working with the not-for-profit Tata Energy Research Institute (TERI), a leading Indian research institute in New Delhi, India, on a multi-year project to develop a “golden mustard” that will yield cooking oil high in beta-carotene (Pro-Vitamin A). Successful development and adoption of the enhanced oil from “golden mustard” has the potential of helping hundreds of thousands of children suffering from vitamin A deficiencies, particularly in northern and eastern India, where mustard oil is commonly used for food preparation and cooking. Michigan State University’s Ag Biotech Support Project is another major partner in this project, which has funding support from the U.S. Agency for International Development.
In addition, Monsanto and other companies offered the use of their technology royalty-free in support of the “golden rice” project, an application of biotechnology developed by researchers in Switzerland to combat vitamin A deficiency. These efforts, which are supported by the Rockefeller Foundation, and collaborations with research institutions around the world will enable further development and delivery of this technology free-of-charge for humanitarian purposes. It is hoped that technology used to develop golden rice and golden mustard oil might one day be extended to other crops in such as maize, a staple food in many African countries where vitamin A deficiency is also prevalent.
MICROBIAL SEQUENCE DATABASE: In April 2001, Monsanto supported the launch of a Microbial Sequence Database to make important gene sequence information for Aspergillus nidulans (a common bread mold) and Myxococcus xanthus (a soil-born bacteria) available to academic researchers. Sequence data is made available free of charge to investigators at non-commercial research institutions in exchange for granting Monsanto the opportunity to license inventions developed from use of the sequence data. The company shared this information in order to accelerate researchers’ efforts to identify and study certain genes, and to provide a road map for understanding plants and microbes to help improve nutrition and health in the future.
PAPAYA: Monsanto supports the Papaya Biotechnology Network of Southeast Asia with technology and training to help develop papaya resistant to a pernicious plant virus that has devastated papaya, one of Southeast Asia’s most important crops. Formally launched in 1998 by ISAAA, the Network also works to enhance the region’s capacity to develop and deploy other transgenic crops in the future, and includes national institutes in Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia.
POTATO: In 1991, Monsanto and the Center for Advanced Studies (CINVESTAV) – a government research laboratory in Irapuato, Mexico – embarked on a cooperative project to develop, through use of biotechnology, virus resistance in varieties of potatoes grown by resource-poor Mexican farmers. The partnership was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation and facilitated by ISAAA. The partnership involved having two CINVESTAV scientists work with Monsanto scientists to learn how to conduct potato transformation and apply it to varieties in Mexico. To help facilitate the project, Monsanto granted rights to use its virus-protection technology in certain varieties of potatoes. The research phases of this project are complete and the partners in Mexico are moving toward approval and distribution. When the transformed, locally adapted varieties are grown by subsistence growers, they can expect to see a yield increase, potentially up to 10 to 15 percent.
RICE GENOME: In April 2000, Monsanto announced that Dr. Leroy Hood, a University of Washington researcher working under contract for Monsanto, had decoded the genetic make-up of rice and developed the first working draft of a crop plant. Monsanto offered to make its draft rice genome sequence data available at no charge to public researchers involved in the International Rice Genome Sequencing Project (IRGSP).
In August 2000, Monsanto completed the transfer of its rice genome data to the IRGSP and announced the launch of a new Internet web site, www.rice-research.org, which opened its rice genome sequence database to researchers around the world. Also that month, Monsanto announced that it would provide royalty-free licenses for all of its technologies that can help further development of "golden rice" and other pro-vitamin A-enhanced rice varieties.
SMALL HOLDER PARTNERSHIPS: For more than ten years, Monsanto has partnered with universities, corporations, foundations, government and non-government organizations to facilitate the sharing of existing commercial technologies as well as new technologies with resource poor farmers in developing countries. These partnerships provide training for small holder farmers to use certified seeds, herbicides, fertilizers and reduced or no-till farming practices that improve the economics of farming and enable growers to enter into the agricultural marketplace. As a result, small holder families have seen an increase in food security and income, as well as reduced pressure to migrate or to attempt to increase food production by cultivating marginal lands.
SOYBEAN GENOME: In May 2001, Monsanto donated a Simple Sequence Repeat (SSR) genetic marker to the United Soybean Board's Technology Utilization Center to build upon the group's ongoing work on the Better Bean Initiative program, which was created to encourage the development and availability of soybean seed with enhanced composition traits. The SSR marker, which identifies the locus for the low palmitic fatty acid gene within the soybean genome, is expected to quickly accelerate the Better Bean Initiative's goal of developing a high yielding soybean variety that produces soybeans significantly lower in saturated fat.
In June 2001, Monsanto announced that it would provide the USB with a series of bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC)-end sequences that will enable scientists to better understand the soybean genome by identifying the location of specific genetic markers on chromosomes within a genome. In turn, the USB will provide the data to non-profit Better Bean Initiative participants to encourage more efficient and accurate plant breeding. Future discoveries developed using these sequences will be widely distributed in the public sector and accessible to the soybean research community.
SWEET POTATO: Monsanto has partnered with researchers in Africa – including the Kenyan Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) and the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) – to conduct biotechnology research to develop a sweet potato that protects itself from a devastating plant virus that can contribute to reducing yields by as much as 80 percent. Following extensive research, field tests of virus-resistant sweet potatoes have been initiated in Kenya and African farmers may soon be able to grow a sweet potato that protects itself from disease, enabling it to play a critical role in the fight against hunger.