00:00Feeding the growing global population is one of the critical issues we are facing in the 21st century.
00:06Agricultural bioscience is leading the way in sustainable food production,
00:11and a Chinese-owned company based here in the UK is at the forefront using new technologies such as AI.
00:19Rahul Pathak reports.
00:21Breaking ground for groundbreaking innovation, the tagline for Syngenta's new Biostar facility.
00:28The Chinese-owned company's R&D Centre is here at Jellots Hill, just under an hour from London.
00:35Syngenta is one of the world's leading companies in agricultural bioscience,
00:40developing crops that can survive and thrive in a rapidly changing world.
00:45Now the new $130 million facility will bring together hundreds of experts working at the very cutting edge of agricultural
00:52bioscience.
00:53Now using tools like AI, the new Biostar Centre will hope to transform a global crop production
00:59to help create more resilient food systems in the face of climate change, pests and population growth.
01:06You need to think that every day there is a new pest, a new disease and new weeds that are
01:12appearing across the globe.
01:13There is a situation where we have resistance that is appearing to products that are already launched to the market.
01:19So we need always to be ready with new solutions that we bring in a timely manner.
01:24How is AI helping to really transform agricultural production?
01:27AI has a huge role to play.
01:29It's already playing an important role today in agriculture.
01:33For example, today, you know, we can predict the biology of the product without testing the product into the field.
01:40Once, you know, artificial intelligence will be fully integrated across all the different disciplines in the R&D organisation,
01:48we will be able to bring technology to the market quicker.
01:51This site at Jellots Hill has been at the forefront of agricultural research for nearly 100 years,
01:57from developing new fertilisers in the 1920s to playing a vital role in national food security during the Second World
02:05War.
02:05It's hoped the new Biostar Research Facility will help continue that legacy of innovation.
02:11Here on this site we have maybe 800 scientists from 45 different countries,
02:16and so it's all about bringing the best brains, the best skills, into an environment where they can do their
02:23best work.
02:23Many scientists are concerned we're heading for a global food shortage by 2050,
02:28while the world's population is expected to reach nearly 10 billion.
02:32To keep up with demand, food production will need to increase by 70% based on figures from 2019.
02:38The research being done at places like Jellots Hill and Syngenta has never been more vital.
02:43Rahul Pathak, CDTN, at Jellots Hill, near London.
02:53All right, let's hear more now from Syngenta UK's President Mike Hollands,
02:57as he explains why the firm chose Britain as the home of its latest expansion.
03:02The UK has got a lot of things going for it in terms of research and development.
03:06First of all, you're after talent, you're after technical people.
03:10Of course, there's a long history of research in the universities here, and we've been able to draw on that.
03:17Also, it's a very good place to attract talent from other parts of the world.
03:22And so if you can get, I mean, here on this site we have maybe 800 scientists from 45 different
03:28countries,
03:28and so it's all about bringing the best brains, the best skills, into an environment where they can do their
03:35best work.
03:35And, of course, that also underpins the investment that we've just done.
03:39In the 21st century, with global food production becoming such a critical issue,
03:43I mean, agricultural bioscience is becoming increasingly important, isn't it?
03:46I think with the amount of volatility in the climate at the moment, you can see big shifts in what's
03:53going on.
03:53That could be shifts in yields, but it could be also shifts in pest pressure
03:58and what farmers need to do to try and maximise their food production.
04:02So, and I would say that over the last few years, there's much more knowledge at a very senior government
04:08level
04:09about the need for robust food supply chains.
04:12So what are you hoping to achieve with this new Biostar facility,
04:15and how in particular is AI helping to transform agricultural production?
04:20First of all, if you're talking about R&D and you're talking about a lot of crops and a lot
04:25of pests and a lot of weeds
04:27in a lot of different soil types and a lot from different countries,
04:31you can just tell the amount of data that you create is enormous, okay?
04:36And we've been very good at analysing this.
04:38But on this site, we've been using artificial intelligence in one form or another since 2019.
04:43So we were a very early adopter of some of these technologies.
04:47And its ability not only to look at your data and find the patterns,
04:50but increasingly look at what you need to do to improve your products is a very big game changer for
04:57us.
04:58Is there a threat that the adoption of genetically modified crops could have a negative impact on biodiversity?
05:04Oh, that's a big question.
05:06I mean, I have worked actually in the US where we had a lot of GM corn and GM soy.
05:13And it was always a big debate about whether this was sort of a causal effect
05:17or something else that was going on in the environment.
05:20I think, as Syngenta, we would typically say we don't see a big degradation of biodiversity.
05:27That said, you know, there's a lot of corn being grown and there's a lot of soybeans being grown
05:31and that would suggest that, you know, maybe other things have space around it.
05:35But we don't think that there's a causal effect.
05:37And what about the other ethical questions about the work that you're doing here?
05:41I mean, there are people who have concerns about the manipulation of plant DNA in a laboratory setting such as
05:45this.
05:46Well, I mean, we don't actually do any of that sort of work here in the UK.
05:52But I would also point out that some of that manipulation, as you say, has been done for many thousands
05:59of years.
05:59And it's called breeding.
06:00OK, so let's just be clear that there are new technologies, of course.
06:06But a lot of this has been something that's been happening both naturally and man-made over a very long
06:12time.
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