Mr. Martin van der Voort: Developments in the EU Vegetable Seed Sector

The European Union (EU) vegetable seed industry continues breeding and production of vegetable seeds to cater for all geoclimatic conditions around the world to enable availability of vegetable products to every consumer worldwide.

© Courtesy of Euroseds

Nevertheless, the challenges of pests and diseases continue to rise with the impact of climate change and thus increasing the complexity of the breeding programs.

We have seen many countries around the world revising their regulatory pest lists and requirements for import, further increasing trade barriers.

Besides all these challenges, the vegetable seed sector continues to work tirelessly to ensure that the seed is available where it is needed and continuously engage with all stakeholders including the policy makers to guarantee that food security threats are mitigated.

Creating a user friendly database

Some notable developments in the vegetable sector include an increase in the availabilities of tomato varieties that are resistant to the Tomato Brown Rugose Fruit Virus (ToBRFV) on the market for the growers. More and more ToBRFV tomato resistant varieties will be made available in the coming years, ensuring the increase in diversity of the varieties available for the growers and consumers.

The Euroseeds Section Vegetable and Ornamentals (SVO) has accomplished various activities in the year 2023/2024. These include creating a user friendly database for the Harmonised Resistance Terminology tables. These were also updated in January 2024 and can be found on the Euroseeds website or via the link: https://euroseeds.eu/hrt/.

In addition, the section updated the product specifications in May 2024. The product specifications for vegetable precision seeds are Euroseeds recommended specifications for germination and varietal purity of precision seeds, which can be accessed via the Euroseeds website: https://euroseeds.eu/app/uploads/2024/06/11.0086.11-Precision-seed-1.pdf

Plant protection

Within the SVO, there is a growing concern on the future availability of seed treatment products especially against soil-born diseases in the EU. Knowing that majority of the vegetable seeds are treated during processing and the increasing limitations to the availability of key plant protection products on the market that are EU acceptable, poses a huge concern for the vegetable sector.

With this in mind, in a few years to come the vegetable seed sector will have no plant protection products available for treating many vegetable species and this can lead to more challenges for a sustainable vegetable farming.

Meanwhile, the EU vegetable seed sector continues to follow the debates at EU parliament and Council levels on the EU Plant Reproductive Material (PRM) and New Genomic Techniques legislative proposals.

The Section Vegetable and Ornamentals (SVO) together with the rest of the seed sector advocates for a fair Seed Marketing Legislation that covers all PRM and ensures accountability, quality assuarance and plant health as pre-requisites to marketing or exchange of any plants or plant products.

The section supports that EU should move with modern times on breeding techniques by providing the breeding sector with the necessary tools that advances breeding process. The SVO will continue the discussions on the Commission proposal texts (EU Plant Reproductive Material (PRM) and New Genomic Techniques legislative proposals), and the amendments from Parliament and the Council at its meeting in October, during the Euroseeds Congress in Copenhagen, Denmark.