Canola is one of four crops in Nuseed’s global portfolio which also includes sorghum, carinata, and sunflowers with an intense focus on advancing the agronomic performance and developing new end-use products.
The facts on Nuseed’s global canola program:
- #1 canola seed position in Australia
- Top 4 position globally
- Novel oil profiles
- Growth into high-value markets; North America, Europe, and South America
- Omega-3 Program with proprietary products for aquafeed (Aquaterra®) and human nutrition (Nutriterra®)
While novel oils are a key opportunity for canola development, its primary production challenges are disease-related, explains Van Ripley, Nuseed Canola Research & Development Lead in Canada. Ripley is heading the North American R&D program for variety and hybrid advancements with both input and output plant traits.
“Blackleg, sclerotinia, and clubroot are probably the three highest potential ones,” he says.
From 2010 to present, Nuseed has seen a significant escalation in their canola research and development program. And, after several years of local field trials, Nuseed is now poised to enter the North American canola market.
“At the Nuseed Horsham Innovation Centre in Australia, we are continuing to explore trait introgression and advancement of novel canola improvement technologies, such as double haploid and molecular markers,” says Nelson Gororo, Global Canola R&D Lead in Horsham, Australia. Nuseed is strengthening its Australia canola market leader position with elite blackleg resistance, new HyTTec and Truflex hybrids, plus two new high yielding Monola varieties to meet the increasing demand in Australia for its heart-healthy oil profile.
As well as combining input traits for disease and weed management for high yields, Nuseed’s canola program has focused on output traits for completely new value and market opportunities, like Monola in Australia and Nuseed Omega-3, currently grown in the United States.
World demand for the essential nutrient omega-3 is much greater than wild fish stocks can sustainably supply. Working with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), Nuseed is now commercially producing their proprietary omega-3 canola in Montana and North Dakota.
End-use customer brands Aquaterra for aquafeed and Nutriterra for human nutrition are already capturing the markets’ attention.
