Critical Need
The world is in dire need of a portfolio of sustainable crops to meet the dual challenges of increasing global population and rising earth temperatures. One promising path forward is accelerating seaweed production, which requires no arable land, freshwater, or fertilizer to produce large amounts of seaweed. Currently, high costs of production and limited development of breeding programs in the seaweed industry prevent the scaling of the domestic industry necessary to compete with other commodities.

Technology Vision
Improved breeds of seaweed can increase farmer profits, but current methods rely on sourcing seed from wild stocks, limiting cultivar development and farming windows. MacroBreed combines cutting-edge genomic breeding methods with novel nursery techniques to rapidly generate high performing kep cultivars on demand. MacroBreed has also developed a crossing scheme to produce non-reproductive kelp using naturally occurring mutations, thus protecting local ecosystems and environments while unlocking certain markets.

Potential for Impact
Scaling the seaweed industry can unlock potentially large seaweed-based markets, such as human food, biofuel, bioplastics, and animal feed, that are currently unreachable due to the high costs of production. One of the most effective ways to reduce these costs is through increasing performance of seaweed through breeding programs. MacroBreed will improve the seed stock of cultivated seaweed in service of a growing industry that will both directly and indirectly fight climate change via carbon-limiting products and direct carbon removal while limiting impact on the ocean.

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MacroBreed