In Commodity News 30/04/2015
Australian wheat growers may benefit from the success of their Chinese wheat growing counterparts.
Wheat yields in China have increased from an average of less than a tonne per hectare, to five tonnes per hectare, since 1945.
Wheat has been growing in China for at least 4,000 years, but it has only been in the past century that Chinese scientists have been formally breeding wheat.
That is a lot later than their European counterparts.
None the less, yields have increased by much more than the global average increase of less than 1 per cent per year.
University of Western Australia professor Kadambot Siddique is part of a team that has unearthed 100 years of data on Chinese wheat growth.
He said yields were analysed from data that was collected from records and breeding reports on more than 1,850 Chinese wheat varieties, across three wheat growing regions.
“The breeding strategy has been targeted and tailored towards three regions,” he said.
“They focussed on a number of parameters, one is significantly reducing the plant height, they also increased the grain weight or kernel weight, they increased the number of grains per spike, they also reduced the seeding rate.
“China is dryland, plus they have got good rainfall plus some supplementary irrigation.
“The other aspect is the soil type in China is very good, rich in organic matter, good rotation.”
China is the largest wheat producer in the world, last year it grew 126 million tonnes of wheat, but the majority was consumed domestically.
In comparison, Australia grows about 26.5 million tonnes of wheat, 18 to 20 million tonnes of that is exported and about six per cent of wheat exports go to China.
Professor Siddique said to feed its growing population China needed to increase its grain production by 36 per cent over the next 15 years.
He said yields could improve further by increasing kernel size and kernel numbers per spike.
Technology and optimisation would also play a part.
Professor Siddique said there was potential for Australian grain growers to benefit from China’s research.
“We don’t have a lot of Chinese germplasm in Australia, although various breeding programs have limited access to that.” he said.
“So one way is that we have increased collaboration both ways with China and Australia in relation to wheat breeding, wheat genetics, sharing of germplasm and technology will help indirectly us as well.”
