Innovations In Cereals
Pan-European Barleys
With the large maltsters now operating Europe-wide to produce beers and lager of a consistent taste and specification, the hunt is on for barleys that can provide the same consistent brewing quality wherever they are grown.
While not yet known for its spring barleys in the UK, KWS has a burgeoning Pan European barley breeding programme centred in Germany.
The programme, lead by Burkhard Schinkel, was originally based on material from separate East and West German breeding pools and now works across 18 different European countries.
Each year it now tests some 45,000 double haploid lines aimed at the mainstream brewing market and a further 5,000 low GN types for distilling, which are with KWS UK’s barley breeder, David Harrap.
“Our aim is to provide raw materials for the industry of a standard consistency wherever they are grown,” says Burkhard. This includes a wide range of conditions from Ireland in the west to Russia in the east, as well as France in the south and Scandinavia in the north.
“In early generations it is very difficult to assess kernel quality, but as soon as we can generate 100g samples we put thousands of genotypes though micro-malting tests.”
KWS aims for low-N barleys – rather than intermediate types, arguing that these lower N types can be managed to provide higher N’s in the field if this is what the end-user needs.
Untreated trials are used to assess yield stability and with fungicide use restricted in some EU countries, the company views resistance to mildew, Rhynchosporium, net blotch, brown rust and increasingly Ramularia as very important traits.
“Spring barley is a short season crop and so we also need to be sure that drought tolerance is not an issue,” says Burkhard. “Varieties need to be able to perform in short season climates such as Russia, but again have the ability to hold on and provide higher yields in the longer seasons found in the UK.”
KWS UK barley breeder, David Harrap describes malting spring barley breeding as a hit and miss affair. “Only 1 in 150,000 crosses make it, it is bull’s-eye or bust,” he says.
“Spring barleys have to put on growth as soon as possible and because they are relatively short rooted they need to be able to make the most of the conditions. Yield stability across any season is a really important characteristic and this is why a Pan European programme helps identify truly robust types,” says David.
In recent years, Pasadena has been a big variety from the KWS programme in countries Denmark and Germany and is still widely grown in Russia. Now though the commercial focus in mainland Europe is on the variety Conchita, which is national listed in a number of countries, and providing positive scores in malting tests in Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Russia.
