Missouri Soybean Signs Partnership to Market Trait

(Missouri Farmer Today) –   The Missouri Soybean Merchandising Council is partnering with Schillinger Genetics to commercialize the commodity group’s new high oleic soybeans. The agreement includes licenses for breeding soybean varieties with the high oleic technology, as well as a seed increase program to sell the varieties scaled up through that program.

The soybean trait, the result of soybean checkoff research dollars, is non-GMO and has marketing implications, especially for the cooking oil industry.

“Our original goal, back when the USDA came out with their edict on trans fats, was how are we going to keep our market share globally,” Missouri Soybean CEO and executive director Gary Wheeler says. “And this is what we delivered.”

Wheeler says John Schillinger, the president and founder of Iowa-based Schillinger Genetics, is a good partner to take the soybean trait, patented by Missouri Soybean, to the commercial market.

“John is quite well-known nationally,” Wheeler says.

While the technology was developed through non-GMO methods, it can still be placed into a GMO product, Wheeler says. The high oleic, low linolenic soybeans increase the potential uses of soybean oil.

USDA researcher Kristin Bilyeu, retired University of Missouri soybean breeder Grover Shannon and current MU faculty Andrew Scaboo and Pengyin Chen worked together to develop the high oleic, low acid soybeans.

“We were trying to identify sources of natural variation,” Bilyeu says. “We couldn’t find that happening in nature. Our big breakthrough was that by combining two things that do happen in nature, we could combine them into one trait.”

Researchers had been trying to reduce polyunsaturated fatty acids present in the soybean oil. The high oleic, low linolenic soybeans met that goal.

“The reason behind selecting for this trait was the industry knew they were losing market share in vegetable oil due to health concerns,” Bilyeu says. “This new oil will meet those concerns.”

She credited checkoff funds that supported the research.

“The growers reinvest a portion of their profits into research to improve their product,” Bilyeu says.

Wheeler says the commercialization of the high oleic soybean technology will bolster the soybean industry.

“Farmers should be proud of what their research dollars did,” he says. “They actually developed this six to eight years ago, and it’s taken time to perfect. We know it took quite the investment, but we feel the ROI (return on investment) on this is priceless.”

Wheeler says this is an example of the checkoff program succeeding.

“The checkoff works,” he says. “The checkoff delivers for our farmers, and it’s extremely important that we continue these efforts.”

The high oleic technology helps grow and sustain current markets, Wheeler says.

“It gives them options,” he says. “It gives them the opportunity to save seed if they decide to save seed. There’s a direct relationship with checkoff and markets.”

Farmers wanting to purchase the high oleic soybeans can use patent logos and numbers to identify them. All packages of commercial seed developed through the partnership will be marked with patent 9,035,129 or 9,198,365 and with the Missouri Soybean Merchandising Council’s logo.