Wheat monoculture may be sustainable after all, according to researchers at Washington State University in the United States.

That was the message from the interim dean of the University’s College of Agricultural, Human and Natural Resource Sciences, James Cook, to the 4^th International Crop Science Congress in Brisbane.

The Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) was a major supporter of the congress, which was attended by more than 1000 delegates from 65 countries.

Dr Cook said recent University research had documented a remarkable and apparently widespread microbiological control of a root disease in wheat and barley when those crops were grown continuously in the same location.

“Considering that the forebears of modern wheat evolved as a virtual monoculture, the lack of genes for resistance to root diseases implies that some other defence mechanism exists. Such protection develops against take-all with wheat monoculture,” Dr Cook said.