A HISTORY OF THE VEGETABLE SEED INDUSTRY: THEN VS. NOW | DOMESTIC VS. INTERNATIONAL
You can find yourself anywhere in the United States, and still grow almost any vegetable you could possibly think of. The same goes for most of the remaining world.
Today, the US—as well as many other parts of the globe—has a thriving vegetable seed industry, made up of numerous seed companies. Up until about 300 years ago, however, no such industries existed.
Against all odds, we’ve found a way to bring all our favorite crops together and make them available to everyone—farmers, gardeners, and hobbyists alike—even though they originate from regions scattered all over the planet.
But what was it like before all this was possible?
With globalization changing the economic tides a few centuries ago, a desperate need for better food security around the planet emerged, with our smaller food systems unable to meet certain global needs. Fruits, vegetables, and grains needed to be grown fast enough—and in vast enough quantities—before world hunger outpaced what the world could currently grow at the time.
But most importantly of all: the world needed seeds.
Global food production simply couldn’t be possible without a world supply of the very best vegetable seeds. Thus, the vegetable seed industry was born.
HUNGER IN THE WORLD: HOW SEEDS PLAYED A PART
Before global and international production of food began—and before the international seed trade was established—food systems were much smaller. So was the seed trade itself, with local stockpiles and catalogues providing the means of food production for different localized parts of the world.
Most farmers and growers also got their own seed their crops from the previous year, saving them for the next season. Seed-sharing and exchanges also helped keep seed available. At the time, that was all that was needed.
The first beginnings of vegetable seed business as we recognize it today began in Europe in the early 1700’s. Seed catalogues were kept only by small farmers and growers, but eventually turned into bigger enterprises to meet the demands for agriculture in the New World—America.
Across the Atlantic in the west, American colonies were only familiar with vegetables from their own native soil. They needed seeds to grow these foods for surviving and sustaining themselves—either those, or newly discovered American seed varieties bred to be more efficiently transported, grown, harvested, and eaten.
Of course, not all these seeds could be found in the New World. To meet this demand, vegetable seed businesses in Europe were established to send the colonies food—but none were established locally in America for some time.
SOWING THE SEEDS OF THE U.S. SEED INDUSTRY
Eventually, homegrown local seed catalogues in Europe transformed into flourishing seed businesses. Seed trade grew even more from that continent, with much of Europe’s most successful and favorite crops spreading to other developing countries like America—but not America alone.
Later in the 1700’s, vegetable crop seeds were also introduced to other colonized countries, such as India. As developing countries—including the US—increased food production during this time, small seed businesses germinated overseas, pitching in to help with local and growing demands for food and agriculture to support growing populations.
This was how the international seed industry was established. Still, these businesses remained small, and companies were also yet to breed any standard commercial seed for a standard commercial crop, much like our modern monocrops and other varieties today.
Back then, most farmers still saved their own unique seeds and heirlooms for next year’s growing season, relying little on these small businesses. For this reason, demand back in the day remained low.
Nevertheless, Europe’s temperate crops like cabbage, broccoli, carrots, and asparagus began to spread east and west, cultivated in parts of the world they would have otherwise never known. Vegetable seed varieties these European businesses gathered from other continents like Asia and Africa—such as garlic, eggplants, beans, yams, and melons—spread with them.
In the meantime, vegetable varieties indigenous to the New World entered the international industry. These included tomatoes, peppers, corn, potatoes, pumpkins, and many others, the seeds of which also made their way to other parts of the world through international trade.
THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL SEED VARIETY: BRED IN THE US
According to some records, the very first commercial seed for widespread vegetable production—a variety of cabbage—wasn’t bred until the late 1800’s. The business that bred the seed was established in the United States, making the US the homeland and very first inventor of commercial seed.
But even though this cabbage variety was somewhat successful, the appeal and need for globally-recognized and widely commercially available seed varieties hadn’t quite caught on. Needless to say, these early seed companies were yet to experience a real boom—especially since growers could buy the seed, grow it, and then save that patented seed from their own crops.
What’s more, the US government in the early 19th century gave free seed to the people as part of public government programs. This was vital to ensuring the survival of colonists in the 1800’s depended on growing food for themselves, but it dampened the need for a highly lucrative commercial seed industry—both domestic and international—for a time.
It was sometime in the early 20th Century that these seed companies began breeding hybrid vegetables. These more pest- and disease-resistant varieties, with strikingly unique traits compared to their purebred kin, could not be replicated from saved seed.
This gave the seed industry a profitable edge for a time, with ownership over specific hybrids that had very desirable cultivation advantages compared to non-hybrid seeds. It also made their seeds more desirable and competitive with free seed, despite it being free—and thus, hybrids created an industry.
But it wasn’t until the start of World War II that the vegetable seed industry catalyzed and changed forever—and especially in the US, where the seed industry really boomed successfully for the first time.
MEETING FOOD DEMANDS HERE AT HOME
With the advent of World War II, there came a problem: Europe, the globe’s central source for the international seed trade, became cut off from the rest of the world during wartime.
Though international trade wasn’t quite as robust then as it was today, the world’s main global seed supplier and center of the seed trade suddenly vanished—with food security suddenly a great concern.
In response to this shortage and crisis, already established seed companies stepped up to fill the demand. Thus, the domestic vegetable seed industry was created in the US.
Sometime before the war in 1924, the American Seed Trade Association—a banded group of non-government seed companies—also finally convinced the US to do away with free seed allotments. This would allow private seed companies to grow, diversify, and fill in the supply gap caused by Europe pulling out of the international market, and not have to deal with needless competition.
This lobby before the war, followed by the dried-up international seed supply, created a boom in seed demand and innovation—all started in the United States.
New seed varieties and hybrids were rapidly developed to stock the seeds for supply at home in the United States. And, logically, the United States seed companies moved beyond borders to then fill some worldwide demand.
Around the 1960’s, an enormous sea of competing seed companies saw many of the less successful ones disappearing, or getting bought out by larger, rapidly expanding successful seed-growing operations.
Though very successful with their size, some other seed companies resisted the advantages of expansive growth, instead putting an emphasis and favor on quality.
Since the 1980’s as well, the last remaining seed companies were able to thrive when finally allowed to patent the genetics of their own seeds. This helped ensure that the breeds contained within each seed were of the highest quality, health, and ultimate ability to survive until harvest.
Since then, seed companies can successfully refine and develop their breeds—as well as new ones—for years to come.
A SPROUTING INDUSTRY TO MEET GLOBAL FOOD DEMAND
What started as small but robust seed companies grew rapidly into lucrative and successful businesses, both large and small, each working hard to fill a now practically universal demand for seed.
After all, the need for healthy, nutritious foods will never go away. For that reason, neither will healthy and successful seed varieties.
Today, what was once hundreds—if not thousands—of US seed companies are now made up of the last strong population of thriving seed companies. These have developed, bred, cultivated, and perfected some of the world’s most cherished and favorite plant varieties: from watermelons, radishes, and bell peppers to corn, soybeans, grains, flowers, and even grasses.
What were once companies solely responsible for feeding the US with seed varieties are now able to help feed the world, as well as provide plants for decoration, enjoyment, and hobby.
Most importantly of all, these companies—some of them still in business today, with traditions and legacies reaching back to some of the oldest seed saving business in the US—are leaders in working hard to maintain successful food security and horticultural diversity.
Without the rich history of the seed industry behind them all and making their successes possible, we wouldn’t have the amazing varieties of fruits, vegetables, flowers, grasses, and ornamentals that populate and make the world a better place today.
WESTAR’S ROLE IN THE INTERNATIONAL SEED INDUSTRY
Here at Westar Seeds International, we’ve been inspired by the hard work, ingenuity, and innovation of those old seed companies.
Like those smaller businesses back in the day, we have a passion and an eye toward ultimately enhancing the grower’s experience. We’re not about size or rapid growth, or even about being the biggest in the business.
Instead, we take pride in emulating those small US businesses dedicated to growing seed for food and other crop production back in the day: whether for populations within our borders and beyond them, or for countries and nations all over the globe.
Though our ethic is that of a small business with a customer-centric focus, we are nevertheless a rapidly growing and successful international company, with customers all around the world—50 countries and counting.
We started our business in 1992. But when working with us, you’ll feel like you’re working with a company with the hundreds of years of experience behind the entire international seed industry today.
It’s all due to our appreciation of the in-depth history, hard work, and engineering that went into all the most successful crops of today’s world—varieties which we work endlessly to improve for the benefit of our customers and growers.
Reference
Dillon, Matthew (2005). A Brief History of the Development of the Seed Industry – The Shift from Public to Private Seed Systems. Seedstory.Wordpress.com. Retrieved from https://seedstory.wordpress.com/a-brief-history-of-the-seed-industry/
