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Potatoes are the fourth most important food crop in the world after maize, rice and wheat.
Four key European industry bodies have backed new gene-editing techniques for use in the potato breeding sector.
Most of the existing potato breeding programmes in the world are situated in the European Union (83%).
Out of the 157 private companies active in potato breeding, 150 are situated in the European Union (96%).
The industry groups Copa-Cogeca, Europatat, Euroseeds and Starch Europe recently published a joint release stating that access to new genomic techniques is essential to meet future challenges in the potato sector.
New genomic techniques (NGTs), like gene editing, are currently banned in the EU, as they fall under the same legislation as gene modification (GM).