陶氏农业科学有限责任公司 宣布对澳大利亚小麦产业进行新的投资。
Dow AgroSciences 与 HRZ Wheats 达成协议，HRZ Wheats 是一家成立于 2003 年的小麦育种公司，专门为澳大利亚高降雨地区的小麦农民提供高产、优质的小麦品种。据该公司称，陶氏益农加入了现有投资者 CSIRO、新西兰植物与食品研究、Landmark 和谷物研究与开发公司 (GRDC) 的行列。
根据协议，陶氏益农和 HRZ 将交换小麦种质资源，HRZ 将获得先进的育种服务、技术和资金，以帮助加快向澳大利亚农民提供优质小麦品种。
“Wheat breeders have not had the full benefit of the advanced breeding technologies that have been developed for use in high value row crops over the past 20 years, so the rate of increase in crop yield hasn’t kept pace,” said Peter Dryden, Dow AgroSciences regional commercial unit leader for Australia and New Zealand in a statement. “At Dow AgroSciences, we see wheat as an important global crop so we’re excited to be providing the HRZ breeding team with access to the knowledge and tools that we’ve developed in working with crops like corn, cotton, canola, soybeans and sunflowers. In essence, we hope this investment will mean better products come to the market more often — which will create value for grains industry participants.”
HRZ Wheats is the youngest of Australia’s main wheat breeding companies and was established in 2003 with a specific charter to meet the needs of growers in high rainfall areas. It is expected that farmers in wetter areas may transition from traditional grazing and pasture operations into cereal cropping as rainfall patterns become more variable in coming decades.