DA approves nine applied biotech research projects

Nine applied biotech research projects aimed at increasing the country’s production of abaca, coconut, makapuno, and papaya will be implemented by the Department of Agriculture (DA) starting this year.

Agriculture undersecretary for policy and planning Segfredo Serrano said the projects had been approved for implementation by the DA under the administration and leadership of Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap.

Serrano said the projects have been carefully evaluated and approved for funding, which will partly come from various agencies of the DA namely the Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR), Biotechnology Program Implementation Unit (BPIU) and other funding institutions of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).

Two major activities, he said, had been identified, namely (1) Targeting the world market for natural ingredients and creating a natural ingredient cluster of industries and (2) improving the competitiveness of traditional agri-fisheries products.

According to Serrano, the DA is now focused on strengthening three biotech facilities at the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice), the Philippine Carabao Center (PCC) and the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources — National Fisheries Research and Development Institute (BFAR-NFRDI) to transform them into "centers for excellence."

The DA, he said, aims to train and come up with a pool of 200 scientists in the next 10 years under the program.  The program also seeks to operationalize two new projects, namely the DA Biotech Research Fellowship Program and the DA Biotech Incubation Facility, he said.

Aside from coming up with a genetically modified abaca resistant to bunchy-top bract mosaic and mosaic viruses, scientists will develop and identify new and improved hybrid rice parental lines resistant to Bacterial Blight, establish the genotypic identity of commercially-released hybrid rice cultivars and their parental lines.

For coconut, Serrano said scientists from the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) are now refining techniques in cloning coconut.  Another coconut project involves the accelerated development of coconut synthetic variety.  Serrano said the DA will also conduct pilot field testing of biological control agents against the Coconut Leaf Bettle.

Scientists are also working on the micropagation of makapuno using plumular tissue as explants.

Meanwhile, scientists at the University of Los Baños are now working on the introgression of the Papaya Ring Spot Virus-resistance into transgenic papaya with delayed ripening trait. 

According to Serrano, the implementation of the projects is part of the full implementation of the 10-year DA Biotechnology Research, Development, and Extension (RDE) Program the "DA Biotech Roadmap" which was developed last year by experts in the field of biotechnology.

"The project highlights the direction of the Philippine agriculture and fisheries towards global competitiveness in traditional and modern biotechnology," he said.

According to Serrano, while working on the country’s capabilities on modern biotechnologies, substantial and sufficient resources will be explored to develop natural ingredients industry capable of beating the world market. – Biolife News Service