Meeting the quality demands of today’s global durum markets is a complex game of hitting several moving targets at once. Now a new research study promises to boost the playing field in Canada’s favor.

Over the next three years, scientists at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Semi-Arid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre in Swift Current will develop a DNA map of durum end-use quality traits. The map will give durum breeding programs a blueprint to respond rapidly to changing demands, by developing new durum varieties custom-made for specific markets.

This research is supported in part by the Endowment Fund, administered by Western Grains Research Foundation.

"The ability of the Canadian durum wheat breeder to respond quickly to market preferences depends on the amount of information and tools that he has to select for those end use quality traits that are in high demand," says lead researcher Dr. Ron Knox. "This project will allow the breeder to most efficiently produce cultivars with the specific quality traits of color, texture, nutrition and flavor demanded by a variety of customers."

The Canadian durum crop has posted a farm value of close to $1 billion annually over the past five years, and comprised an average of 27 percent of western Canadian wheat acreage. But this standing is threatened by increasing global competition.

The Canadian Wheat Board forecasts that Canadian producers will lose about 10 percent of their market share by 2008, principally to Australia, which has dramatically increased its durum research over the past decade. Mexico is also poised to increase exports through a strong durum breeding effort in cooperation with CIMMYT, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center.

A key area of concern is that Canada is in danger of falling behind in the development and use of new biotechnology tools to improve the selection of quality traits, says Knox. DNA mapping can dramatically strengthen its footing.

"A detailed DNA map will improve our understanding of the genetics of durum so that we can exploit the appropriate traits to keep Canadian durum on the leading edge."

DNA mapping represents a major step forward in crop research technology, he says. In recent years, researchers have developed molecular markers – identifiable pieces of DNA that signal the presence of desired genes – to simplify and improve the often painstaking breeding selection process. Mapping goes a step further by collecting markers and other genetic information to produce a larger and more detailed picture; with a map, researchers can see the relative location of many different genes. This gives them much greater power to characterize genes and determine how they interrelate.

"Compared to simple marker development, the initial investment is greater for mapping genetic traits," says Knox. "But the longer term outcome of mapping is to have a much greater database of interrelated information."

Western Grains Research Foundation’s Endowment Fund has contributed over $17 million to nearly 200 crop research projects in Western Canada since its inception in 1983.