Monheim, Germany – Bayer CropScience and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia’s national research agency, are expanding their collaboration to assess the sustainability of new generation crops. The two-year agreement will develop and apply models to assess the system-wide consequences of new generation cereals in the context of global environmental and food security challenges.
The new project will build on the long-term research alliance and license agreement from June 1998, as well as the cereals collaboration and license agreement from June 2009. While the latter focused on developing crop varieties with greater yield, more efficient nutrient utilization and tolerance against stress, the new project will assess their full environmental impact including their influence on the carbon footprint of cereal production. The findings will be publish in international science forums to ensure transparency and objectivity in evaluation of the results.
“Innovation and Sustainability are the foundation of our business. We are convinced that innovative new generation crops can deliver greater yield per hectare while requiring less resources such as water and energy. This project will develop methodology to assess these benefits at a plant, field, country and global level,” said Dr. Joachim Schneider, Head of the Business Operations Unit BioScience of Bayer CropScience.
“New generation crops offer enormous potential to help Australia and the rest of the world deal with the future demand for food. Through reduced input requirements and/or improved efficiency of use of water, energy and nutrients, they also have the potential to reduce pressures on the environment, including reduce the greenhouse emissions contributing to climate change,” said Dr. Brian Keating, Director of CSIRO’s new Sustainable Agriculture Flagship. “This cooperation with Bayer fits perfectly with the top-line objective of the Flagship which is to raise agricultural productivity by fifty percent by 2030, while halving carbon emissions intensity.”
The new program follows on from an existing collaboration between the two organizations, which has resulted in a number of successful outcomes including work focused on fibre quality in cotton and CSIRO’s pioneering gene silencing technology.
Source: http://www.press.bayer.com/baynews/baynews.nsf/id/1CE852FBEDDDCA21C12576E9003A5B21?Open&ccm=001
Press Release dated March 18, 2010
About Bayer CropScience
Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the fields of health care, nutrition and high-tech materials. Bayer CropScience AG, a subsidiary of Bayer AG with annual sales of about EUR 6.5 billion (2009), is one of the world’s leading innovative cropscience companies in the areas of crop protection, non-agricultural pest control, seeds and traits. The company offers an outstanding range of products and extensive service backup for modern, sustainable agriculture and for non-agricultural applications. Bayer CropScience has a global workforce of 18,700 and is represented in more than 120 countries. This and further news is available at: www.press.bayercropscience.com.
About CSIRO
CSIRO is Australia’s national science agency and one of the largest and most diverse scientific research organisations in the world. Its role is to deliver great science and innovative solutions for industry, society and the environment. CSIRO works on new ways to improve quality of life, as well as the economic and social performance of a number of industry sectors through research and development. Established in 1926, CSIRO is the single largest employer of scientists in Australia, with more than 6.500 people conducting and assisting with scientific research at 57 sites in Australia and around the world. Find out more at: www.csiro.au.
