Bayer AG will begin selling certified organic seeds early next year for some of the most popular produce grown in greenhouses.
The German-based conglomerate is reacting to demand from growers, suppliers and consumers who are seeking a more organic provenance in the food chain, said Inci Dannenberg, president of global vegetable seeds at Bayer, in a video call.
“We are looking at where we have had the most demand from our customers,” she said.
Some of the development of the seeds is occurring at Bayer’s vegetable development lab and campus in Woodland, Dannenberg said, adding that parts of the new organic seed development are occurring all over the world. The Woodland lab develops traits and improvements for tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and melons, among other products, and the new organic lines will first be introduced for tomatoes, sweet peppers and cucumbers.
World standards for labeling of foods as organic are changing, and organic certification will be moving through the entire life cycle to include seeds, Dannenberg said. That means that organic seeds will be grown from organic plants in protected environments under organic standards and not treated with any substances that are not organic.
The new seeds, available early next year, will be the first to be certified organic and raised to organic standards. They will be used at first in the U.S., Mexico, Spain, Canada and Italy.
The varieties will be sold under both the Seminis and De Ruiter vegetable seed brands of Bayer.
Seminis is the brand Monsanto bought in 2005, along with its research campus in Woodland. Bayer got the assets of Monsanto in its $62 billion acquisition of Monsanto Co. in 2018. The Woodland lab uses cross-breeding techniques and rapid prototyping to develop beneficial traits for vegetables. Bayer employs more than 350 at its campuses in Woodland and Bayer Crop Science in West Sacramento.
