Patrick du Jardin, a new challenge: making biostimulants more popular

A look back at Patrick du Jardin, head of the Plant Biology Research Laboratory at Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech.

Patrick du Jardin joined Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech in the early '80s and has remained with the company ever since. Now head of the Plant Biology research laboratory within the Plant Sciences division, he began his career as a student at Gembloux. Graduating as a bioengineer in 1986, he then focused on the study of plant molecular genetics. After numerous travels, publications and congresses, he is now pursuing a new challenge: the inclusion of biostimulants in European standards. He has not abandoned his teaching mission, however, and believes that the bachelor's degree is an essential step in the life of a bioengineer.

Growing plants differently

For his thesis, Patrick du Jardin first benefited from an IRSIA (now FRIA) grant, then was entrusted with a temporary assistantship, focusing his research on the genetic improvement of plants. Completed in 1990, his thesis led him to take an interest in plant GMOs, a subject that would become particularly sensitive a few years later. He quickly became an expert in the field, and was regularly contacted by the media to speak on the subject. In addition, he worked at Belgian and then European level through EFSA, the European Food Safety Authority, the body in charge of assessing food-related risks. Patrick du Jardin ended up as vice-chairman of the GMO expert panel, alongside his other academic duties. He also sat on the ethics committee of INRA and CIRAD in France for many years, where the social issues raised by GMOs and other new technologies were studied in a multi-disciplinary framework that he particularly enjoys.

On the research front, with his colleagues (notably Pierre Delaplace and Marie-Laure Fauconnier), he first worked extensively on the post-harvest physiology (storage and germination) of potatoes. Around 2010, he repositioned his research to focus on plant physiology in the field. For him, it was urgent to cultivate plants differently by studying their interaction with soil microorganisms. For better and, above all, more sustainable yields, it is essential to manage agrosystem fertility differently, and to focus on the physiological properties of plants in their interactions with soil microbiota.

Biostimulants

2012 marked a new turning point in Patrick du Jardin's career with his studies on biostimulants. Until then, farmers had relied on pesticides and fertilizers to maximize their harvests. With the advent of biostimulants, it's a new way of looking at agricultural and market gardening production: we apply microorganisms to plants, as well as complex substances such as algae or humic acids, which will modify their physiology and "boost" their nutrition or tolerance to environmental stresses. This sometimes resembles a kind of "super vitamin" that improves their tolerance to cold, drought and so on. It's also a way of developing their root system in a different way, with multiple agronomic effects.

After the laboratory research, it was necessary to evaluate the advances made by industries in the field, but also and above all to define European legislation for these biostimulants, which did not exist at the time. Patrick du Jardin therefore embarked on a consultancy project to present a report to the European Commission in 2012. The impact of this report was so considerable that he traveled extensively and took part in the publication of various works. He was also the chairman of a congress on the subject, bringing together over 1,600 participants in 2019. The current stage is his involvement with the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) in defining harmonized European standards, safety and efficacy standards to which the marketing of CE-marked biostimulants in Europe will have to conform. Europe is a leader in this field. Many small and large industries have understood the stakes involved in producing these biostimulants, and are demanding protocols that certify their quality and precise areas of action.

Naturally, this new approach to plant nutrition in the context of high environmental performance agriculture is passed on by Mr du Jardin to his students. He also regularly invites experts in the field to his lectures. As already mentioned, Patrick du Jardin attaches great importance to teaching, and he feels that Gembloux students have done well during this health crisis. He himself, like many of his colleagues, has reinforced new modes of communication, and believes that today's students are perfectly capable of "juggling" several media. This in no way detracts from the richness of face-to-face communication, which must remain a basic medium.

On campus, the researcher is delighted to be able to rely on a tool such as the Botanical Garden, which he manages within the new Wasabi platform ; a tool which will be further enriched and popularized in the months to come. After all, "to know plants is first and foremost to call them by their names ", he insists.