Last September, Norfolk Plant Sciences Ltd – a spinout company from the John Innes Centre in Norwich – welcomed the decision by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) which means US home growers should be able to purchase seeds and grow the nutritionally enhanced high-anthocyanin purple tomato from spring 2023. They have also set up a US subsidiary called Norfolk Healthy Produce.
Now the scientists behind the purple tomato hope the UK will follow suit. Prof. Cathie Martin who developed the purple tomato at the John Innes Centre in Norwich, told BBC News that the product had “exceptional antioxidant properties”, having crossed the genes with a snapdragon flower.
“The greater good would be if people in the UK in particular, but world over, if possible, could have more nutritious food to eat”, she said.
Earlier this year, the UK government changed the law to enable gene-edited food to be developed and sold in England, but campaigners against GM food have called the purple tomato a “vanity project.”
Liz O’Neill from the campaign group GM Freeze said, “We’ve got naturally purple foods, lots of them, that have their own natural range of micro nutrients. And what people need to do is eat a much wider variety of foods, rather than looking for novelty tomato products.”
The purple tomato is said to be rich is anthocyanins, which have been linked to a wide variety of health benefits, including increased cardiovascular health and the prevention of both cancer and dementia.