THE GRDC southern panel toured Victoria recently, with members of the medium rainfall team paying a visit to the Wimmera.
As part of the visit, members of the panel took a look at the new Bayer breeding initiative at Longerenong, near Horsham.
Bayer has invested $14 million in a new breeding centre at Longerenong College, where it will breed wheat and canola, as part of a international push by the company into the breeding space.
Bayer canola breeder David Pike said the company had released its first Australian canola variety and was working on wheat. Wheat breeder at Bayer Maqbool Ahmad said he hoped to see commercial varieties in the paddock in four to five years.
The panel heard Bayer is starting its wheat breeding in Australia from scratch.
“In other areas where we have started breeding wheat we have bought some genetic material, but in Australia we are relying on material in the gene banks,” Dr Ahmad said.
He said the Bayer wheat breeding program would be across all Australian climate zones and quality types.
“We are not focusing on one particular sector of the market.”
Dr Pike said Australia’s end point royalty (EPR) system was a key reason Bayer was investing in breeding here.
GRDC panel member Bill Long said the value of the EPR system needed to be highlighted to growers.
“We need to point out all the extra dollars in research we get because of the EPR system.”
On the canola front, Dr Pike said Bayer was working with material to find varieties with better pod shattering tolerance.
“We’ve done some work in Canada and now we are interested to see the results in Australia where the canola is entering a period of extreme heat, rather than getting colder as is the case at Canadian harvest.”
