Casey Chumrau, Washington Grain Commission executive director, provides an update to farmers during Washington State University's dryland research station field day in Lind in June 2023. The Pacific Northwest wheat industry will weigh the results of grower surveys on the next steps regarding GMO wheat technology, Chumrau says. (Seth Truscott/Washington State University)

The Pacific Northwest won’t be the first region to bring a new GMO wheat variety to market, the director of the Washington Grain Commission says.

Not until customers are comfortable with such a trait, at least.

“Our customers aren’t there yet,” Casey Chumrau, commission executive director, told the Capital Press.

Commission staff attended grower meetings in January and February and sent out surveys to farmers to see how they wanted to proceed with the new technology.

The surveys were issued in response to Argentina-based company Bioceres Crop Solutions’ HB4 transgenic wheat trait, which incorporates drought tolerance transferred through a sunflower gene.

The USDA in August 2024 approved HB4, the first GMO trait ever deregulated in the U.S. for wheat, for research. The trait is unlikely to be commercially available or grown for at least three to five years.

Survey response

Grower responses to the commission’s surveys reflected a “wide range of opinions,” Chumrau said.

“We heard time and time again that they may be interested in new technologies, but only if our customers are willing to accept it,” she said. “If we do not have an export market, then we don’t have an industry. We have a lot of work to do still with our markets to understand if or when they might accept new technologies.”

There were some strong opinions both for and against, she said. It likely makes a difference where in the region a respondent is farming, their growing conditions and how dependent they are on the export market.

“Even those that did say that they are interested in those kinds of technologies and maybe are already using them in other crops have the caveat in their responses,” Chumrau said.

The survey responses continue to reflect the caution the overall wheat industry has demonstrated regarding GMOs over the past two decades.

U.S. Wheat Associates and National Association of Wheat Growers issued a document in 2008, outlining steps a company would have to take to earn the approval of the industry before bringing a GMO trait to market.

Next steps

The grain commission is taking information from the surveys and weaving it into decision making. The commission will meet with Idaho and Oregon wheat commissions in the fall to discuss possible next steps.

At that meeting the groups will “talk more specifically about HB4, but really biotechnology here in the Pacific Northwest and what that looks like, if at all,” Chumrau said. “We really feel strongly that we need to move forward as a region. These grower surveys are going to play a significant role in those discussions.”