By Angela Brown

New agreements to develop more wheat and barley varieties lead to more profitable crops, experts say

Nov 1, 2020 | 9:45 AM

NORTH BATTLEFORD, Sask. – Area agriculture representatives believe the recently signed agreements to help develop more varieties of wheat and barley will better ensure crops are hardy enough to withstand the challenges faced by Western Canadian farmers.

The Canadian Wheat Research Coalition (CWRC) committed more than $22.6 million and the Canadian Barley Research Coalition (CBRC) invested more than $1.5 million, both over five years, to the core breeding agreements with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) to develop more wheat and barley varieties.

The CWRC is a collaboration of the Alberta Wheat Commission, Saskatchewan Wheat Development Commission, and Manitoba Crop Alliance.

“We are very excited to be able to support the variety of development activities of Agriculture Canada,” Harvey Brooks, Saskatchewan Wheat Development Commission general manager, and CWRC president, said. “We know those varieties that producers have had access to for the last number of years have been extremely beneficial and a high pay-off to producer funding. We are looking to carry that forward into the future.”

The CWRC took over responsibility for producer funding of wheat varietal development from the Western Grains Research Foundation, which includes working with AAFC, so producers can access new seed varieties with improved genetics to grow a more profitable crop. The $22.6 million commitment of producer funding is an increase of $2.6 million over the previous agreement.

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“It covers everything from variety development capacity support in the areas of actual plant breeders, technicians, disease specialists,” Brooks said. “It covers all activities, right from germplasm development. But the end goal is field-ready varieties.”

CWRC core breeding agreements are funded proportionally by province, based on the previous year’s production, with 53 per cent coming from Saskatchewan, 32 per cent from Alberta, and 15 per cent from Manitoba, based on the 2018-19 production year, according to the CWRC’s website.

“There is always a need by producers to have better quality varieties continuing to come out that address the diseases, insects, and environment they are going in,” Brooks said. “We look over the last five years where we have had essentially a widely variable and, I would say, historic drought conditions in some years. And, we are still pulling off average to above-average crops. So that is a testament both to better agronomics but also better varieties we have for the producers.”

Representing the barley contribution in the agreements, the CBRC is a collaboration between Alberta Barley, the Saskatchewan Barley Development Commission (SaskBarley), and Manitoba Crop Alliance (MCA).

Jason Skotheim is the chair of SaskBarley. He said developing more barley varieties will help farmers remain competitive, and will reduce their business risk as well.

Skotheim also grows barley on his family’s farm north of Prince Albert.

“The opportunity this creates is just maintaining that genetic potential,” Skotheim said of the benefit to producers of being able to access newer varieties. “Keeping barley as one of the more profitable crops on our farms is really the big objective. And you do that by getting better disease packages, getting benefits that are created by better breeding.”

He said it’s a favourable time for barley producers currently, as prices for feed are catching up to malt prices, so pricing is more competitive.

“It’s turning into a fairly competitive crop when you look at it,” Skotheim said. “It’s maintaining its own. So it’s a good year for barley.”

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angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @farmnewsNOW