grdc growers' report - Grains Research & Development Corporation

investment highlights
New Products
Group
New Products objective
To deliver new products and services
(both on farm and off farm) that will
assist growers to effectively compete in
global grain markets.
What the New Products group
does and how it does it
The New Products group targets
opportunities both pre-farm gate and
post-farm gate, by investing in R&D and
commercialisation of new grain and farm
products and services which provide
growers with additional options in crop
production inputs and end uses.
New Products actively identifies national
and international technology relevant to
the Australian grains industry; builds
partnerships to develop products and
services and deliver them to growers;
undertakes product development to meet
market requirements; and develops robust
business cases that demonstrate the
market demand for and value of any
product or service that the GRDC and its
partners propose to invest in.
Funds invested
$14.90m was invested through New
Products in 2010–11. In addition, there
was significant co-investment from
research partners.
Sophisticated electronics and guidance systems
dominate modern tractor cabs, but component
complexity may be discouraging a lot of growers
from adopting some of the related PA systems.
Photo: Brad Collis
New grain products
The New Grain Products portfolio identifies
and develops opportunities for the use of
grain for a range of markets, including
human food products, animal feed products
and industrial markets. Maintaining product
integrity through improved grain hygiene is
also a key theme for this portfolio.
Food products
GRDC investments in new grain food
products focus on the development and
commercialisation of novel grains with
additional health benefits for easy
incorporation into grain-based foods.
Highlights from the portfolio in 2010–11
include:
• Potential commercialisation partners
showed sufficient interest in high-amylose
wheat material to warrant field trials of the
best high-amylose wheat lines at sites in
North America. The field trials will generate
data that will be useful in developing a
data package to support deregulation
should a decision to go to market in
North America and Australia be made.
• The ultra-low gluten barley project reached
a milestone in product development with
the generation of a line in which no gluten
can be detected (using current detection
methods). The project also reached a
significant step towards commercialisation
with the submission of a business and
marketing plan for a commercial product
from an interested commercial partner.
• The GRDC, along with technology
co-owner CSIRO, entered an alliance
with Nuseed to use gene technology to
develop and commercialise a canola
plant that provides a sustainable
alternative to the current marine sources
of omega-3 oil. The new canola variety is
targeted to be commercially available by
2016. The initial market for the oil will be
in the aquaculture industry, where the oil
may replace fishmeal, particularly for
farmed salmon. Use in human food
supplements is also an intended market
for the oil.
Feed products
Interest in using near-infrared (NIR)
calibrations grew across the livestock
feed manufacturing sector. The GRDC has
licensed the commercial development of
the NIR calibrations to the Pork CRC Ltd.
In 2010–11, 17 licence holders, four
commercial milling groups, six laboratories
and five plant-breeding companies used
the technology. A major feed manufacturer
has taken the next step in implementing
the calibrations by fitting them on the feed
mill processing line to measure nutritive
value in real time.
Nitrogen and phosphorus based fertilisers make up
the largest part of most growers’ input costs.
Photo: Kellie Penfold
Industrial uses
The GRDC seeks to identify opportunities
for the use of Australian grains for both
existing and innovative industrial purposes.
The Crop Biofactories Initiative is a joint
investment between the GRDC and CSIRO
that aims to engineer safflower seeds with
fatty acid compositions that match specific
industrial applications, to replace products
that are currently manufactured from
petrochemical feed stocks. In 2010–11, the
initiative made significant progress toward
each of the three target oils in safflower.
The initiative continues to engage with
potential commercialisation partners to
share positive results.
To assist with the commercialisation of a
new industrial safflower variety, the GRDC
accessed improved safflower germplasm
from international safflower gene banks,
and will multiply the lines during 2011 to
generate seed for field evaluation in 2012.
These lines may yield germplasm that is
better suited to the Australian production
environment and may fill the gap in
available safflower varieties for growers.
A project with the University of Sydney is
assessing the conditions required for, and
chemical products that result from, the use
of hot-compressed water technology to
process cereal crop residues such as wheat
and barley straws. The project has shown
that a number of high-value chemicals can
be made from cereal straws. The next step
for the project is to determine the economic
feasibility of using this processing technology
to process cereal straws.
GRDC GROWERS’ REPORT 2010–2011 23