Annual Meeting Summary 2006
Date:  February 21, 22, 23, 2006
Location:  Embassy Suites Airport in Kansas City, Missouri

WHEAT QUALITY COUNCIL ANNUAL MEETING SUMMARY

The Wheat Quality Council (WQC) completed its annual meeting, forum and technical review sessions on February 21-23, 2006 at the KCI Embassy Suites Hotel in Kansas City with approximately 120 industry participants in attendance.

The WQC is the only industry-wide organization that brings together all wheat industry participants from breeders and producers to millers and bakers/processors. These participants are provided information on the milling and baking quality of wheat varieties that will be released and processed in their facilities in the next few years.

The breeders have an opportunity to network with industry in determining what qualities the millers and bakers would like to see in new wheat varieties.

Board of Trustees

The meeting began with the WQC Board of Trustees meeting on Tuesday evening. After dealing with financial reports, membership reports and budget issues, the annual election was conducted. The following people were selected to serve on the WQC governing board for 2006: Mark Norton, Bay State Milling, Chair; Mark Hodges, OK Wheat Commission, Past Chair and Virgil Smail, KSU, Vice Chair. Those officers plus Brian Sorenson, NCI; Jan Levenhagan, Mennel Milling and Jim Powers, Perten Instruments will make up the Executive Committee for 2006. The rest of the board members are Dave Green, ADM Milling; Vance Taylor, ND Mill; Mike Fassezke, Star of the West; Jay Romsa, General Mills; Dave Venberg, Horizon Milling; Bill Gambel, American Ingredients; Brett Myers, Westbred; Phil Farmer, AgriPro/Coker; William Johnson, AR Wheat Growers; Laird Larson, SD Wheat Commission and Ed Souza, ARS Soft Wheat Lab.

Forum (A full story is forthcoming in Milling & Baking News)

The forum this year dealt with Biotech Wheat, and was very well received.

Rollie Sears, AgriPro/Coker (standing in for HP Zhou, Syngenta) presented information about the costs and challenges of bringing a new transgenic trait to market. He also stated that the much discussed scab resistance gene from Syngenta is still 6-8 years away.

Daren Coppock, NAWG and John Oades, US Wheat Associates outlined the positions of their organizations and what they are doing to advance transgenic wheat.

Dr. Bill Wilson, NDSU, discussed the challenges and opportunities in marketing biotech wheats both at home and abroad.

Dr. Wilson was also the dinner speaker following the annual banquet on Wednesday night. He did an outstanding job of explaining the demand for end-use quality traits and compared the US system to others around the world.

All the presenters did a great job and should receive thanks from all of us.

Variety Reviews

Thirty-five breeder submitted lines and checks were entered for evaluation this year. All were grown and harvested during the 2005 crop year. These lines were broken down into twenty hard winters, twelve hard springs and three soft winters.

In the hard winters, the following decisions have been made based on breeder comments at the meeting:

• Colorado State-has one hard red with high yield potential for release in the fall of 2006.

• KSU-Hays, Kansas has two hard whites for potential release in the fall of 2006. One is resistant to Wheat Streak, Mosaic Virus; one is resistant to Beyond herbicide.

• NE-“Goodstreak” has been released and is moderately resistant to stem and stripe rust. “Infinity CL” has been released as a decent end-use quality Clearfield wheat (resistant to Beyond).

• OK-Three hard reds still under evaluation and one hard white that probably will not be released.

• SD- One hard red with excellent rust resistance for possible 2007 release and one hard white with release date still pending.

• AgriPro- Two excellent hard reds, both released. “Postrock” seed available in fall of 2007. “Neosho”, with seed available in fall 2006 was selected “Best in Show”, receiving the annual millers award. Cathy Butti was presented the award for her long-time excellent service on the cereal chemistry team at AgriPro/Coker. Congratulations Cathy!

In the hard springs, results are as follows:

• MN- One line released but not yet named, one line still pending.

• ND- One line released as “Howard”, with two lines still pending.

• SD-One line released and named “Traverse.”

• WorldWide Wheat – Two lines entered, release status unknown.

• Westbred- Has released an early maturing line named “Rush.”

• AgriPro- One line released and named “Kelby.”

The focus in spring wheats remains on tolerance to fusarium head blight.

The soft winter program only had two entries this year, both from Purdue. They seemed to be about average for soft wheat quality and no information was available on the release status.

Cooperators

A total of 29 cooperators from across the US helped to evaluate the milling and baking/processing qualities of the thirty-five lines and checks entered from the 2005 growing season. These cooperators deserve a huge thank you for their time, resources and dedication to our program. We could not accomplish this work without them.

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