Noted: “Public plant breeding was on life support for a while,” says Bill Tracy, chair of the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Department of Agronomy and one of only two public sweet-corn breeders left in the United States. According to the Organic Seed Alliance’s 2016 report, State of Organic Seed, public and private investments in organic plant breeding and other organic seed research have increased by $22 million in the last five years. Clif Bar’s Seed Matters initiative, which Dillon directs, has raised $1.5 million for organic seed research and education.
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