Australia & New Zealand
March 15, 2007
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The AUSGRAINZ alliance
will continue to develop high yielding,
disease-resistant wheats with innovative traits. |
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The successful grains research and
development alliance between Australia’s
CSIRO and
New Zealand’s Crop & Food
Research, AUSGRAINZ, will announce its research directions
for a further five-year term in Geelong today.
With a focus on the huge potential of Australia’s High Rainfall
Zone (HRZ), for the past five years the alliance has been
developing high yielding disease resistant wheat varieties with
innovative traits. Some of the material is dual purpose and can
be grown for forage and grain or grain only.
“Science and technology are key drivers for the success and
growth of global agribusiness,” says CSIRO Plant Industry Chief,
Dr Jeremy Burdon. “By combining the skills and resources of
CSIRO and Crop & Food Research, AUSGRAINZ can bring enormous
capacity to bear on issues for the Australian and New Zealand
grains industries.
“The alliance works closely with the Geelong-based Southern
Farming Systems – a non-profit organisation dedicated to making
farming in high rainfall zones more profitable.”“CSIRO’s track
record in plant physiology, elite cultivar breeding and cereal
chemistry, including in-house quality testing, gives the
alliance high-level expertise along the full length of the
production chain. CSIRO breeding lines include robust resistance
to the most important diseases of the HRZ, including all rusts
and barley yellow dwarf virus. For some crops we are introducing
novel traits such as water use efficiency, salt tolerance and
early vigour.”
Crop & Food Research General Manager of Market Development,
Peter Barrowclough, says the alliance’s access to international
supplies of germplasm is a key factor in the breeding program.
“Germplasm from around the world is being evaluated and crossed
in New Zealand’s stable, high yielding environment to breed high
yielding milling quality wheats with robust disease resistance,
adapted to the HRZ,” he says.
“The support of a farming group with the skills to run long-term
trials is an immense help to the alliance’s breeding efforts,”
Mr Barrowclough says.
“Southern Farming Systems has been running wheat breeding
trials, evaluating agronomic practices and developing management
packages to suit the varieties under development,” says Southern
Farming Systems Executive Officer, Col Hacking. “After watching
new varieties develop it is exciting to see them getting close
to release.”
Four new milling quality varieties, bred specifically for
Australia’s high rainfall zones, are now being considered for
commercialisation. All have excellent yield and appropriate
grain quality traits, as well as outstanding resistance to
stripe rust and leaf rust. The first of these is expected to be
released in 2008.
One new dual purpose feed wheat, which can be grazed before
recovering to yield a grain crop, is in the process of being
commercialised and multiplied for seed sales, which are expected
in 2009. Two other dual-purpose varieties are close to
commercialisation.
Other news
from New
Zealand's Crop & Food Research |
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