Genetically modified wheat research is off to a promising start on the other side of the globe.
Scientists at Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), while attempting to make a wheat with an enhanced starch profile, came up with a line of genetically modified wheat that yields 30 percent more than check varieties in greenhouse trials.
“With this technology we see more vigorous wheat with increased vegetative growth, larger seed heads and larger seed,” Bruce Lee, director of CSIRO’s Food Futures Flagship, said in a news release.
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“If we can achieve significant yield increases in the field, this will have a major impact on food production on a global scale.”
The centre did not respond to interview requests.
Kevin Bender, president of the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association, said it’s an exciting development.
“Yield always tends to be the driver. That’s what attracts farmers to new varieties. How does it yield? Is it going to give me more bushels than anything else? Something like 30 percent, that’s big,” he said.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, global wheat yields have increased by less than one percent per year, so a variety that boosts output by 30 percent would likely be well received by growers who are not opposed to GM wheat.
“To make a big jump like that would be amazing,” said Bender.
GM wheat research suffered a setback in 2004 when Monsanto shelved its Roundup Ready wheat project. But in the last few years, some seed technology companies have started biotech wheat programs, including Monsanto.
Bender is concerned that he sees no GM wheat research conducted in Canada. He worries Canada will be “left in the dust” by countries like Australia, where extensive work is happening on GM wheat.
But he believes the open market will provide a more favourable environment for that type of research because the Canadian Wheat Board, which was a vocal opponent to Roundup Ready wheat, has a smaller role in the industry.
Debbie Miller, president of the Organic Connections conference, doesn’t see any evidence of a more welcoming environment for GM wheat research in Canada.
“I see lots of people getting more concerned about GMOs and lots of people supporting moves to mandatory GM labelling,” she said.
Miller believes there is still no business case for the crop because many important European customers don’t want anything to do with it.
“Why would you want to invest energy in developing something that your customers don’t want,” she said.
“It doesn’t matter if it yields three percent or 300 percent more if it’s not what the market wants.”
But an Australian research consortium believes there will be a market for the crop.
CSIRO, Bayer CropScience and the Australian Grains Research and Development Corp. have joined forces to support the next stage of development for the promising line of Australian GM wheat.
Wheat yields haven’t kept up with corn and soybean yields but it remains a staple crop that will be needed to feed what is expected to be nine billion mouths by 2050 and it is still an important crop in rotations with total global production averaging about 650 million tonnes per year.
“Increasing wheat yields under the water limited environments that Australian growers face is a significant driver for (the Australian Grains Research and Development Corporations),” GRDC managing director John Harvey said in a news release. “This yield technology is an exciting discovery that could lead to a significant impact on wheat productivity.”
