Annex VIII c - English
– New innovative
way to treat seed
SeedGard AB
www.thermoseed.com
A new concept, highly effectiv
and profitable
– environmental friendly
ThermoSeed® is a new concept for
sound and healthy seed.
By using thermal treatment, ThermoSeed allows control of seed-borne
pathogens without use of pesticides.
The treated seed is clean and highly
productive.
ThermoSeed® characteristics
• Very high precision – just as effective as
chemical treatment.
• High throughput process
• Low cost – competes with chemical seed
treatment.
• “Pasteurization” treatment using hot, humid
air.
• Advanced process control technology.
Advantages
• Effects equivalent to chemical seed dressing.
• Broad spectrum.
• Alternative to chemical seed treatment in
conventional farming.
• Allows seed treatment in organic farming.
• No additives – leftover seed has an alternative
value, e.g. for food or animal feed.
Environment and health
• Improved working environment.
• Treated seeds are harmless to humans and
animals.
• No risks for groundwater or eco-systems.
The modern solution
Seed-borne diseases cause serious
problems for crop growers by
reducing the yield and quality of the
harvested product.
Today, most cereal seed is treated with chemicals that control seed-borne pathogens. Both
for environmental reasons and to promote a
good working environment, it is desirable to
reduce the use of chemically treated seed in
conventional farming.
Chemical seed treatment is not permitted in
organic farming, and, to date, access to practical, useful and effective alternatives has been
limited. Organic farming has a great need for
effective methods of seed-borne pathogen
control.
ThermoSeed is competitive with chemical
seed treatment with regard to both treatment
effectiveness and cost. It is therefore attractive
for both conventional and organic farming. The
method has now been acknowledged by SUK
(the Swedish Seed Testing and Certification
Institute), and approved as an effective commercial equivalent to chemical seed dressing
of cereal seed.
The basic principle of ThermoSeed is a selective effect: The seed-borne pathogens are
much more sensitive to the treatment than
the seed itself. ThermoSeed is an advanced
improvement on the hot water seed treatment
method used by many seed companies from
the early 20th century to the 1960s. The hot
water method, however, had low capacity; it
was laborious and energy demanding. In addition, it suffered from low precision, which
often gave insufficient disinfection or reduced
germinability.
Evaluations of cereal seed treatment
have been performed in seven European
countries since 1999.
ThermoSeed was developed on the basis of
new ideas, fruitful research and advanced
process technology. Through its outstanding
precision, ThermoSeed maximizes the disinfection rate and all the disadvantages of hot
water treatment are avoided. Development
of the ThermoSeed method was enabled by
a combination of great competence in areas
such as modern process engineering, seed
biology and seed processing technology.
Performance
ThermoSeed® treated seed used on Swedish
farms since 2002.
Treatment effect
ThermoSeed®
Crop
Pathogen
Wheat
Tilletia caries
(common bunt)
(spring and
Stagonospora nodorum
(leaf and glume blotch)
winter)
Ustilago tritici
(loose smut)
Fusarium spp.
Barley
Fusarium nivale
Fusarium culmorum
(snow mold)
Drechslera graminea
(leaf stripe)
Drechslera teres
(net blotch)
Bipolaris sorokiniana
Fusarium spp.
Ustilago nuda
Ustilago hordei
(loose smut)
(covered smut)
Oats
Drechslera avenae
Ustilago avenae
(leaf spot)
(loose smut)
Rice
Magnaporthe grisea
Cochliobolus miyabeanus
Gibberella fujikuroi
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+*
+
+
+
+
+
+
-
+ = Effects equivalent to chemical seed treatment
- = Limited effect
* = Limited experience with highly infected seed
• Results for cereals: Highly efficient (pathogen control and crop yield increase).
• Results for rice: Highly efficient (pathogen control and crop yield increase).
• Experiences in other crops: Very promising. See the STOVE project (www.stove-project.net)
for tests with vegetable seeds.
Attractive and available
The ThermoSeed processing
system can be implemented on
any scale.
The first commercial ThermoSeed
processing system was sold to Svenska
Lantmännen (SvL). SvL is the dominating seed market actor in Sweden, with
an annual production of approx. 115,000
tons of cereal seed. The installed ThermoSeed processing system replaces a
chemical seed processing line and has
the capacity to treat more than 200 tons
a day.
Pre-testing routines of all seed lots to
be treated is implemented for maximum
reliability and optimal results.
The commercial ThermoSeed
treatment system (>200 tons/day)
installed in the Svenska Lantmännen seed processing plant (Skara
2005).
On-farm
sampling
Pre-test at
Seed lab.
Seed treatment
in plant
Certification
SeedGard AB
Information processing (database,
mathematical models,
know-how)
The ThermoSeed® system, including the seed pre-test and final treatment.
Delivery
Customers’ experience
Lage Ringstad, Manager of the Seed
Department at Svenska Lantmännen.
Lantmännen is the dominating actor
on the Swedish seed market, with an
annual production of approx. 115,000
tons of cereal seed, amounting to almost 70% of the Swedish market for
certified seed. The seed is produced
in five production plants in southern
Sweden.
“We engage in continuous development for improvement of our products and processes. The
first principle of all our development is to improve economic competitiveness to the benefit
of the farmers. However, we put great effort into
reducing the environmental and health impacts
along the whole chain of production. We know
that farmers see seed chemicals as something
they have to accept, but also something they
would prefer to avoid. We notice the same
discussions among people working in seed production plants.
This is why we had an early interest in the new
ThermoSeed concept. Since 2003, we have
been evaluating a smaller prototype of the
ThermoSeed processing system in our production plant in Uppsala. Together with Acanova
(now SeedGard), we treated seed that was then
certified by SUK (the Swedish Seed Testing and
Certification Institute) and sold to our ordinary
customers.
We are very satisfied with our experience. ThermoSeed is a perfect example of a new product
that simultaneously meets very high economical
and environmental requirements. Now that SUK
has approved the method after several years of
field evaluation, it is possible to use the process
for the major proportion of our seed. So it was
definitely the right time to invest in the full-scale
ThermoSeed processing system.”
Farmers’ experience
Jan Cederholm
Henrik Lillje
Former Director of Operations of Ultuna Egendom, Uppsala, Sweden.
Managing Director of Hushållningssällskapet (the Society of Rural
Economy and Agriculture) in Västmanland at Brunnby Gård, Västerås,
Sweden.
Ultuna Egendom manages the farm
properties of SLU (the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences), with
around 1400 ha. of crop production
(mainly cereals), of which 400 ha. are
organic.
”For our purposes, the ThermoSeed treatment
method is interesting for both conventional and
organic production. During 2003, we tested
ThermoSeed treated seed for 40 ha. of winter
wheat at Krusenberg. The crop and the obtained yield levels were good – the same as we
would have expected from chemically treated
seed. Not having to use chemically treated seed
has great advantages, both for the environment
and because leftover seed can be used for
other purposes, for example, as animal feed.”
The business involved in Hushållningssällskapet are consult in cropping and farm economy, official field
tests, etc. Brunnby is also part of a
joint venture with a total of 480 ha. of
mainly cereal production.
”Since I know that scientists have long been
trying to develop a thermal treatment method
with various degrees of success, I was curious
to try out the new concept. Not having to deal
with chemically treated seed is a great step
forward for farmers. I personally investigated
the field with ThermoSeed treated barley, and I
can state that, in terms of treatment effect and
yield, it was equivalent to chemically dressed
seed. The reason for the ThermoSeed people’s
success must be that they have the right mix
of great competence in both engineering and
biology as well as close contacts with farmers,
farming consultants and the seed industry.”
The cleanest seed in the world?
Probably!
SeedGard AB
a spin-off company of Acanova AB, focuses on the
commercialization of the ThermoSeed method and
development of additional seed treatments. Acanova
is specialized in development of inventions for commercial products within the area of agricultural/forestry technology.
ThermoSeed®
– a registered
trademark of
SeedGard AB
Postal address:
SeedGard AB
Box 810
SE–751 08 Uppsala
Sweden
With support from the LIFE Programme
– a financial instrument of the European
Union.
Visiting address:
Vallvägen 2
756 51 Uppsala
Contact info:
Tel: +46 18 67 18 05
Fax: +46 18 67 38 99
e-mail: [email protected]
www.thermoseed.com