New funding from the Saskatchewan government will be channeled directly into wheat research, with the hope of spurring greater public-private partnerships.
Premier Brad Wall made the announcement — $10 million over five years — to an audience of industry stakeholders during Saskatchewan Agriculture’s Wheat Summit in Saskatoon on Thursday.
The funds will be added to the ministry’s Agriculture Development Fund and available to researchers and private companies proposing work that will lead to new wheat varieties, improving yields, quality and disease and weather tolerance.
Wall said the goal is to boost innovation in wheat, which historically has been an important crop for the province and maintains a pivotal role in crop rotations, but which has seen smaller investments than other crops.
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“We’ve seen the success with other crops in this province as research and focus has been applied from governments, the private sector and producers,” said Wall. “Canola is a great story, for example.”
He also pointed to the expansion of lentil acres across the province over the last 40 years.
“It’s a strength for our province. We want to build the next economy, the innovation economy, on the strengths of what we do well today,” said Wall. “We’re very good at agriculture. So we’re going to partner with companies and producers and really focus on wheat to be a part of the solution in terms of worldwide food security.”
The success producers have had with new varieties of other crops, like canola, indicates similar results can be reproduced with wheat.
“We’ve seen that investment already. We’ve seen them respond when industry and governments work together,” said Wall.
