Investment

Canola is Australia's most important oilseed crop with more than 8 million tonnes produced in 2022 and valued at $6 billion. However, canola suffers from unreliable establishment across our major growing regions, which reduces yield potential, increases weed problems and in extreme cases requires costly resowing. We conservatively estimate the direct and indirect costs of poor establishment are between $100M-$200M annually. This problem is expected to be amplified by a changing climate and resulting adaptations in farming systems (e.g. earlier sowing into hotter, drier conditions).

At the heart of the canola establishment problem is the shortness of its hypocotyl (the stem between the roots and the first leaves). The short hypocotyl means that canola seedlings are unable to emerge effectively from deep sowing, a practice growers use in other crops to place the seeds into more favourable soil conditions where there is more moisture and more stable temperatures.

This project builds on a previous GRDC and CSIRO co-investment that identified canola varieties from overseas that had longer hypocotyls and emerged better from deep sowing than any Australian variety tested. In this project, we will transfer long hypocotyl genes from these overseas varieties into Australian varieties using rapid generation breeding and confirm their value for improving canola establishment. The project will provide long hypocotyl germplasm along with efficient selection tools to commercial breeding programs for them to develop the next generation of canola varieties with improved establishment potential.