July 30, 2003

Australia’s $8 billion grains industry has been underpinned by robust new cultivars, such as wheat varieties that have flowed from public research programs supported by grower levies and the Federal Government, via The Grains Research & Development Corporation (GRDC).

The GRDC had sought to make Western Australia-based research and development (R&D) investments commensurate with the state’s immense grain production.

While that priority ensured that the WA Department of Agriculture was the second-largest recipient of GRDC investments, behind the CSIRO, WA did not quite have the research capacity to mobilise the R&D investment that its production warranted.

In 1999, the GRDC formed the Export Grains Centre (EGC) with the WA-based Council of Grain Grower Organisations to help build new research capacity.

The EGC has since identified and invested in commercial breeding opportunities and leveraged private funds to build resources and attract the expertise needed to encourage a vibrant local grains R&D industry.

One of the EGC’s first investments was into http://www.grainbiotech.com (GBA) and this August GBA will release its first four varieties.

GBA has combed the world for valuable germplasm and developed streamlined crossing programs to position itself for the release of its first four varieties only five years after the company launched.

Three of the four varieties will be released in WA and have high levels of resistance to WA’s exotic new stripe rust pathotype, which halved yields in some areas last year.

While private companies like GBA will quickly deliver tangible products to market, the GRDC continues to support blue-sky research at public research institutes, such as the WA Department of Agriculture, the University of WA, Murdoch University and the CSIRO.

These institutes will continue to generate new traits, technologies and methodologies for delivery through Australian breeding organisations, such as Enterprise Grains Australia (involving the GRDC, the WA Department of Agriculture, NSW Agriculture and the Queensland Department of Primary Industries) and private companies such as GBA.