Providing a guarantee to a grower that each bag of seed is true to identity, high in purity and germination capacity and free from major pests and diseases happens as a result of international quality control systems.

However, outside of Ireland, these systems are not as robust and growers can be taking on unnecessary risk when importing seed or when farm-saving seed or in particular when importing non-certified seed on to their farms.

The Irish seed certification system operates as one of the most robust schemes in Europe. While the seed certification system is governed by EU and national legislation, along with international protocols, Ireland is one of only a few countries that operates an official, state-run independent certified seed scheme, which is managed by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM). Growers and others are also reminded that it is illegal to sell uncertified seed.

Ireland is also only one of four countries in the EU that adheres to a zero-tolerance policy in the field to invasive/ noxious weeds such as wild oats and sterile brome, ensuring that Irish certified seed purity standards are at the highest level in Europe.

The presence of these and many other newer grassweed problems in individual fields must now challenge the free movement of contractors’ machinery to help avoid the spread of these problems.

Irish certified cereal seed assembled by seed merchants and sold on farm here is generally Blue Label seed, which is also referred to as C1 (first generation) seed. This differs from other countries such as the UK or Denmark, for example, where the most common grade of commercial seed produced is Red Label seed, also known as C2 seed.

By definition and under EU rules, the standards governing C1 seed are generally higher than those applying to C2 – eg the minimum seed purity of C1 seed is 99.9% versus 99.7% for C2 seed. Equally, sterile brome and blackgrass tolerance levels are set at zero in Ireland while in some cases imported C2 seed has a tolerance level of 10 seeds per 1kg sample. This poses a potential contamination risk for Irish growers if they were to use imported seed, especially if it was produced to a minimum rather than a maximum standard.

Higher voluntary standard

Ireland operates a high voluntary standard on a number of issues. For example, the official EU standard for C1 seed allows the certification of a sample that had one wild oat seed in a 500g test sample providing a second sample had no wild oat seeds present. This would obviously not be pleasing to growers here.

The Irish seed industry has put in place a higher voluntary zero-tolerance standard for the presence of a number of potential threats such as wild oats. This means that if any wild oat seed is found in a sample, undressed or dressed, this whole lot (30t) will not be certified.

A similar zero-tolerance standard exists for sterile brome and the Irish Seed Trade Association (ISTA) has just agreed to have an equivalent zero-tolerance standard for the presence of blackgrass.

If a plant of any of these three grasses is found in the field during a final inspection, or if seeds are found during a seed inspection, then these seed lots must be discarded.

However, it is important to remember that this is not the same thing as a guarantee of zero presence.

While rejection will also take place if infestation is found in the field during official inspection in the growing season, it is possible that seeds could be present in a seed lot that were not observed during field inspection and were not found in any of the seed samples examined.

While there will always be a small risk that this can happen, if a problem occurs the source and process is fully traceable with guarantees in place and recourse for the grower. This is a much more difficult issue to resolve when imported seed is used. This logic also applies to farm-saved seed.

Canary grass is another potential grassweed problem for Irish cereal growers. This specific grassweed is still handled under the official standards and a field would be rejected if plants were found in a field at the final inspection.

Standards are important

Barry O’Reilly from the Department of Agriculture says: “The seed certification scheme has placed significant emphasis on high-quality standards to ensure that growers have access to seed of the highest germination and purity standards. Improved new varieties, coupled with the economic advantages of using high-quality certified seed, have played an important role in improving the competitiveness of the Irish tillage sector. And this will be an even more significant factor in the years ahead.”

In many other jurisdictions self-certification is commonplace and standards are less restrictive. These combine to add to their associated risks. However, Ireland’s strict seed certification system has so far acted to protect and assist crop production for the benefit of Irish growers and the industry. Seed certification helps safeguard Ireland’s reputation for high quality, traceable end-products.

The ISTA represents multipliers, producers and distributors of certified seed in Ireland and promotes the use of certified seed in tillage, forage and grassland crops to ensure the best varieties of seed are made available to Irish farmers.

With close collaboration between the ISTA, DAFM and Teagasc, efforts are focused on promoting Irish certified seed suitable for Irish conditions for Irish farmers and making Irish growers aware of the benefits of using certified seed above imported sub-standard alternatives.