Our new analysis examines the gap between promise and delivery in gene-edited crops

A new report from A Bigger Conversation, Turbo charging nature: The fast promises and slow delivery of gene edited crops, takes a detailed look at one of the central claims driving the UK’s agricultural biotechnology policy – that gene editing will speed up plant breeding and deliver solutions to major environmental and food challenges more quickly than conventional methods.

Drawing on five detailed case studies –low-asparagine wheat, blight-resistant potatoes, virus-resistant sugar beet, omega-3 camelina and the purple tomato – the report finds that, despite decades of work and substantial public investment, the promise of rapid progress has not materialised. Many of these projects have been running for 20 years or more and are still years away from commercial use. In several cases, conventionally bred alternatives have reached farmers and consumers sooner, challenging the idea that genetic technologies inherently accelerate innovation.

The report argues that “speed” has functioned less as a scientific measure and more as a political narrative. During the passage of the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023, government ministers and scientific advisers repeatedly described gene editing as a faster, more “natural” extension of traditional breeding. This framing helped build support for deregulation and for the rebranding of genetically modified (GM) organisms as “precision-bred organisms.”

In practice, the report finds, gene editing remains a laboratory-based genetic engineering process that faces many of the same technical and biological obstacles as earlier GM techniques. Traits such as disease resistance or nutritional enhancement depend on complex interactions between multiple genes and environmental conditions, making development slow, uncertain and expensive.

The analysis also highlights a persistent lack of transparency around public spending. Tens of millions of pounds in taxpayer funding have been channelled into these high-profile projects through the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and other public agencies, yet there is little publicly available information on outcomes or value for money.

Beyond the technical assessment, Turbo Charging Nature situates the debate in a broader context of policy and governance. It suggests that the political emphasis on speed – presented as a route to innovation and competitiveness – has come at the cost of scrutiny, deliberation and investment in lower-tech but often more effective ecological solutions. It argues that while gene-editing projects continue to attract high-level support, approaches such as crop diversification, soil management and agroecology are consistently under-resourced, despite delivering measurable results.

“The story of speed has done its political work,” says Pat Thomas, director of A Bigger Conversation and co-author of the report. “But after thirty years of promises, the technology is still crawling, not racing. It’s time to stop confusing deregulation with progress and start asking what kind of innovation genuinely serves farmers, consumers and the planet.”

The report concludes that gene editing’s “speed advantage” is largely rhetorical. Far from accelerating progress, the focus on rapid innovation has obscured the real timescales, complexities and uncertainties involved in manipulating plant genomes.

As the report notes, “The story that gene editing would make plant breeding faster and more efficient was never only about technology. It was, and remains, about power – who decides what progress looks like, and whose risks are ignored in the rush to achieve it.”