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PIC: Potato variety trials
August 3, 2021 By Julienne Isaacs, courtesy of Potatoes in Canada
Ballerina has high yield, high tolerance to common scab and it did not show second growth in 2020, a hot summer in Ontario. Photo courtesy of Eugenia Banks. Potato variety development takes a long time. In Canada, it typically takes six years before seedlings from crosses made at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s breeding program in Fredericton and Lethbridge make it to national variety trials, and two to four – or more – years after that before candidates complete agronomic trials around the country.
Traditionally, the potato research station in Fredericton has released between 10 and 15 new selections per year, which were then offered to industry bids for private field performance and quality evaluation trials.
But Erica Fava, the potato breeding program biologist at AAFC Fredericton, says AAFC has adopted a new model for potato variety development that takes industry feedback into consideration from the very beginning and streamlines the process. |READ MORE
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