Australia
January 21, 2015

Variety selection for the 2015 winter cropping season has been made easier for grain growers across New South Wales and Queensland following the release of the 2014 northern National Variety Trial (NVT) data.

NVT is a national program, supported by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), which conducts comparative crop variety testing using standardised methods for trial management and data generation, collection and dissemination.

The northern cropping region’s 2014 NVT trial program included nearly 200 trials on properties across NSW and Queensland, incorporating wheat, barley, canola, chickpea, faba bean, field pea, lentil, lupin, oat and triticale crops.

Neale Sutton, of Australian Crop Accreditation System Limited, which manages the NVT program, said the majority of the 2014 trial results had been uploaded to the NVT website www.nvtonline.com.au enabling growers to access all crop specific information including trial data, sowing guides, End Point Royalty and trial locations.

“NVT generates independent information for growers about newly-released varieties of winter field crops, relative to current commercial varieties grown in their area,” Mr Sutton said.

“The information on the NVT website will include data on newly released northern wheat varieties such as Condo, DBA-Aurora (DURUM), Mitch, Sunmate and Viking; new barley varieties Alestar and Maltstar; a new chickpea variety PBA Monarch as well as new canola, lupin, oat and triticale varieties.

 “As growers are well aware, the 2014 season in the north was impacted by drought as well as by frost which presented challenges for yield and grain quality in some areas.”

 Mr Sutton said that along with yield and grain quality information, the NVT website captured individual trial site characteristics and provided commercial variety information and disease resistance ratings.

“New educational videos are now featured on the website providing information about the program and how to use NVT variety performance tools,” he said.

“Another NVT website feature that remains popular is the Google Map delivery system which enables all crop specific information to be delivered to the user ‘at a site near you’.”

Twitter users can also keep abreast of NVT developments by following NVT on Twitter at @NVT_Online

 

Website: http://www.grdc.com.au

Published: January 21, 2015