Quality problems have been sprouting up in export shipments of Canadian wheat.
And that has prompted the industry to take steps to reassure nervous customers, preserve sales and protect Canada’s reputation for quality.
“We’re ending up with dough strength problems due to sprouting and some customers have raised questions about the quality of No. 2 and 3 CWRS,” CWB spokesperson Justin Kohlman said last week.
The committee that sets quality standards for western grains announced that new tighter tolerances for sprout-damaged kernels will go into effect Aug. 1.
Read Also
Organic farmers urged to make better use of trade deals
Organic growers should be singing CUSMA’s praises, according to the Canadian Chamber of Commerce.
In the meantime, wheat arriving at export terminals is being segregated based on sprout damage to ensure that shipments meet customer specifications.
The problems originate with last year’s harvest. In some parts of the Prairies, harvest operations were plagued by below normal temperatures and excessive rainfall.
That led to sprouting, and those sprouted kernels are showing up at export terminals.
The new policy of segregating stocks at terminals has been in effect for the past three or four months, but it carries a price tag.
“Any time you add a segregation to what you’re doing, you take up more bin space … and you certainly have a higher cost,” said Nick Fox, vice-president for terminal operations for James Richardson International, and a member of the western grain standards committee.
It also takes time to identify the sprouted shipments, slowing down the unload process and reducing the efficiency of terminal operations.However, industry officials say any extra costs are outweighed by the benefits of maintaining high quality standards and keeping grain buyers satisfied.
“There are some additional grain handling costs, but it’s certainly less cost than to lose customers,” said Kohlman.
“This will ensure that the quality conscious customers with those dough strength concerns are retained.”
He said the sprouting concerns have forced the board to target a different mix of customers, with more sales being made to the lower value market.
In the past, the board might have been able to deal with the problem by drawing grain from areas where there wasn’t sprout damage.
But with hundreds of small elevators torn down and replaced by dozens of big ones, that’s no longer possible.
“With the high throughputs out there, it’s harder to segregate by region because they pull grain in from such a large and diverse area,” said the CWB official.
As of Aug. 1, 2001, the tolerances for sprout-damaged kernels will be as follows:
- For No. 1 Canada western red spring, the tolerances will remain unchanged at 0.1 percent severely sprouted kernels and 0.5 percent total sprout-damaged kernels.
- For No. 2 CWRS, the tolerances will be 0.2 percent severely sprouted kernels and 1.0 percent total sprout-damaged kernels (down from 1.5 percent).
- For No. 3 CWRS, the tolerances will be 0.3 percent severely sprouted kernels and three percent total sprout-damaged kernels (down from five percent).
Sprouting in wheat produces an enzyme known as alpha-amylase, which reduces the water-holding capacity of flour, thus reducing the number of loaves that can be obtained from a given weight of flour.
Sprout damage also results in sticky dough that creates handling problems for bakeries and coarse, gummy bread that is difficult to slice and package.
The standard for measuring alpha-amylase activity is known as the falling number, which measures the amount of time it takes a plunger to fall through a thickening mixture of warm, moist, ground wheat.
While the relationship between falling number and sprout-damaged kernels is unpredictable, the impact of severely sprout-damaged kernels on alpha-amylase activity is predictably severe.
