KWS Trinity, the high yielding quality wheat bred by KWS UK, has been given fully approved status after successfully completing milling and baking trials performed by the National Association of British and Irish Millers (nabim).
Following nabim’s final assessment, it has recommended to the HGCA that KWS Trinity is upgraded from provisional Group 1, to full Group 1 status. This is the first quality wheat to pass through the new commercial scale testing and assessment regime introduced by nabim two years ago without delay or difficulty.
Welcoming the news KWS UK managing director Andrew Newby said this was confirmation of KWS Trinity’s inherent grain quality characteristics.
“This backs what we have seen in more than four years of testing from small and large scale milling trials. At every stage KWS Trinity has produced the quality and consistency required of a variety to attain full Group 1 status. Coming at a time when growers are looking for quality wheats with wider market appeal, we can confirm that the variety, which has genuine breadmaking suitability, will be widely available this autumn,” he said.
He took the news to be vindication of the breeder’s strategy of seeking to develop high yielding varieties with strong end-market support. “We have invested significantly in our breeding capabilities over the years, including a Double Haploid programme and, most recently, new laboratories at Thriplow. KWS Trinity is a product of this investment and is an example of our continued commitment to supporting UK agriculture.”
One of the commercial millers involved in the testing assessments was Carr’s Flour Mills, with an annual demand for 300,000 tonnes of wheat per year, it is one of the UK’s leading flour millers. “For our part, we milled two full truck loads in separate mills, having seen lab scale samples over several seasons. It came to us having yielded well on farm, which is the first requirement, milled well to produce a good white flour, demonstrated good dough rheology in gluten tests and performed well in baking tests,” said wheat director Julius Deane. “By all accounts it is a good Group 1 variety, but growers must appreciate that there is a need to match nitrogen applications to yield expectations and protein requirements,” he added.
KWS expects about 9,000 tonnes of seed to be available for planting this autumn, sufficient to take about 5% of the market in KWS Trinity’s first year. As the highest yielding Group 1 variety for the eastern region and joint top highest yielder for the UK nationally, KWS expects it sell-out this autumn.
“Although only recently fully approved, KWS Trinity is well-known to end-users through several years of testing and as such growers can plant it with confidence that there will be strong end-user demand come harvest 2016. We expect contract announcements to follow in the lead up to Cereals,” said Mr Newby.
