On March 3, 2023, Bioceres Crop Solutions Corp. announced that CTNBio, the National Biosafety Commission of Brazil's Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation, has given the full approval for commercialization and cultivation of HB4 Wheat after the conclusion of the safety evaluation.
This approval follows Brazil's previous approval for food and feed use of HB4 Wheat flour in November 2021. The approval also enables the acceleration of Bioceres' collaboration with EMBRAPA (Brazil's Agricultural Research Corporation) to develop subtropical wheat varieties to increase the supply of local materials in the region. HB4 Wheat offers the potential for double cropping – rotating wheat with a summer legume – in regions of the country that are currently limited by water availability.
The HB4 technology has already proven to deliver more than 40% yield increases in environments under severe water stress, based on results from Argentina's recent drought-affected crop. Brazil is the second country in the world where regulatory agencies have cleared HB4 Wheat for cultivation, after Argentina, and completed the approval processes for the company´s wheat target markets in Latin America. Brazil plants 2-3 million hectares of wheat annually, and together with Argentina, plants 90% of South America's wheat acreage. HB4 Wheat has also been approved for food and feed use in the United States, Colombia, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, and Nigeria and for feed use in Indonesia.
