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Developing new high-protein crop varieties

Technology
TECHNOLOGY PRIORITY

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PROJECT TIMELINE
May 2020 to December 2022
PROJECT STATUS
Fund I: Complete
TOTAL INVESTMENT
$2,197,371

Consortia Contribution
$984,649

Cluster Contribution
$1,212,722

PARTNERS

DL Seeds

SeedNet

Sightline Innovation Inc.

Goal

To develop yellow pea varieties that combine high-yield potential and high-protein content than current varieties available for Western Canadian farmers.

Project Summary

The consortium will work with companies to experiment and deploy technologies to other crops across the ecosystem and support the training of students and non-technical agri-food expertise in the use of AI/data trust tools.

The project aims to significantly reduce breeding timelines from the traditional six to eight years by securely trading and valuing data.

The return on investment is to create new high-performance and high-protein yellow pea breeds, combined with bringing to market new data protection and analytics tools.

Results and Impact

  • Accelerating the development of high-protein, high-performance yellow peas through this project has created a pool of enhanced germplasm that is expected to fuel multiple new varieties in the North American yellow pea market. New varieties are expected to enter variety registration testing in 2024 or 2025. Successful candidates would be eligible for full variety registration and then commercialization in 2025 to 2026.
  • This pool of potential candidate lines has significantly increased the volume and quality of potential new varieties for DL Seeds and lays the foundation for several years of improved protein content and agronomic performance in the yellow pea pipeline.
  • This project has opened the door for many future partnerships with pea processors. Along with SeedNet, DL Seeds have been able to discuss future variety needs with eight processors. This has opened opportunities for both DL Seeds and SeedNet to license and multiply both dedicated and shared products that meet specific processors' needs.
  • Successful products will be able to service Canada and US markets and could be evaluated for performance in Europe as well.
  • With the development and anticipated access of these new varieties, SeedNet expects preferential market access, giving them an advantage as a seed supplier to protein fractionation grain buyers.

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