Prairie wheat research groups are committing 3.54 million dollars to the University of Manitoba for wheat breeding activities.

The Canadian Wheat Research Coalition, alongside the Western Grains Research Foundation and the Saskatchewan Winter Cereals Development Commission have committed funding to a core agreement.

The agreement will ensure the continuation of the successful Fusarium head blight nursery program along with the winter wheat breeding program.

The University of Manitoba is one of few fusarium screening nurseries in Canada and provides vital information to the network of western Canadian wheat breeding efforts.

The effort to key to developing future wheat varieties with fusarium resistance.

While the focus with winter wheat research will be delivery of field ready cultivars, development of new genetic tools to improve winter wheat quality will feature heavily.

The agreement is an increase of 1.6 million dollars from the previous core breeding agreement and includes the training of students as future scientists in wheat research.

The support represents the fourth and final core funding agreement for public wheat breeding programs in Western Canada.

Previously announced agreements include 23 million dollars to Agriculture Canada, 9.6 million to the University of Saskatchewan’s Crop Development Centre and 2 million dollars to the University of Alberta.

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