working for several years<\/a> to bring the purple tomato to Australia from the United States.<\/p>\nManaging director Travis Murphy said the fruit had a “really sweet” flavour.<\/p>\n
“I’m not a tomato eater, I can openly admit that, but I can eat these purple tomatoes. They’re beautiful,” he said.<\/p>\n
Melbourne first to stock<\/p>\n
Now that it is approved, All Aussie Farmers can begin growing and selling the Purple Bliss locally.<\/p>\n
![\"Clear](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/78a56ab8c6f7574184640b2dcbc0c01f.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Travis Murphy says the purple tomato has a sweet flavour. (Supplied: Norfolk Healthy Produce)<\/p>\n
They will be on sale in Melbourne fruit shops around the middle of the year before expanding to other markets.<\/p>\n
“Because this is such a unique product, we want to control how it’s introduced,” Mr Murphy said.<\/p>\n
“We’ll be selling them ourselves off our own wholesale floor so we’re handling everything end-to-end,” he said.<\/p>\n
“We can make sure the product is handled properly and that the grower is getting paid fairly.”<\/p>\n
That first grower is based in Queensland, in the Clearview Valley.<\/p>\n
![\"Several](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/3dd26705b5dcb5de838c59767ed5f1d3.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Travis Murphy (left) says it has been challenging to get regulatory approval for the purple tomato.\u00a0 (Supplied: All Aussie Farmers)<\/p>\n
Mr Murphy said they were chosen because their main crop of medley tomatoes was wiped out by hail just before Christmas.<\/p>\n
“He’s a careful, committed grower who puts a lot of effort into his fruit,” Mr Murphy said.<\/p>\n
“That means we can deliver a top-quality product to fruit shops who can then pass that quality on to consumers.”<\/p>\n
A question for the consumer<\/p>\n
Victorian Farmers Federation president Brett Hosking welcomed the go-ahead for the GM tomato, saying it was important technology was embraced.<\/p>\n
![\"Man](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/27eebb5b5c6afd5c799a42e20e0e3e6e.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Brett Hosking says science and farming work hand in hand. (Supplied: GrainGrowers)<\/p>\n
“We’re starting to realise that science and food production work hand in hand,” he said.<\/p>\n
“The way we ensure consumers get the best eating experience is by embracing what we know from research, innovation and technology combined with traditional growing practices.<\/p>\n
“A lot of GM food products in Australia aren’t actually consumed directly.<\/p>\n
“Take canola, for example, we produce oil from it, [but] that oil doesn’t contain any of the DNA.<\/p>\n
“This tomato though is a product you put straight on your plate. A fresh food that you chop up and eat whole.”<\/p>\n
Second GM ‘wave’ unlikely<\/p>\n
Unlike the purple tomato, most other GM crops in Australia are bred to solve pest, disease and agricultural issues.<\/p>\n
But molecular plant biologist Joseph Pegler from the University of Newcastle doubts there would be a surge of GM crops modified for nutrition.<\/p>\n
“It’s certainly possible that we’ll see more genetically modified crops in the future,” Dr Pegler said.<\/p>\n
“But this doesn’t mean we’re about to see a large influx of GM crops released into the Australian environment.<\/p>\n
“The regulation around genetically modified organisms in Australia is very strict and highly transparent.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Genetically modified tomatoes the colour of a plum are set to go on sale in Australian fruit shops…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":445973,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[231262,64,63,231260,31282,44,231263,231261,63805,99723,23229,34454],"class_list":["post-445972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-all-aussie-farmers","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-genetically-modified","tag-gm","tag-news","tag-purple-bliss","tag-purple-tomato","tag-snapdragon","tag-tomato","tag-university-of-newcastle","tag-victorian-farmers-federation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=445972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/445973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=445972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=445972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=445972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/p>\n