A PROJECT looking at developing new nutritionally-rich foods based on tropical pulses had been awarded $750,000 in the first round of the Advance Queensland Innovation Partnerships program.
The project, which is led by Professor Sagadevan Mundree from the Centre for Tropical Crops and Biocommodities at QUT, is one of five major research projects named in the first round of the innovation partnerships program.
Minister for Innovation, Science and the Digital Economy Leeanne Enoch said the projects were aimed at boosting the Queensland’s credentials as a major innovator in agriculture, with a focus on giving the state the edge in national and overseas markets.
Other projects include addressing cattle tick resistance, improving the productivity of prawn farms, and using biotechnology to produce new animal feed supplements.
“The market for tropical pulses is huge,” Ms Enoch said. “Queensland is already one of the largest exporters of chickpeas and mung beans in the world. Prof Mundree and his team will look to how we can broaden the market for our tropical pulse industry. In particular, they’ll look at using pulses to develop low-allergen, gluten-free food products that are tasty and highly nutritious.
“If they can pull this off, the benefits for the industry, and the agricultural sector as a whole, will be enormous.”
Tropical pulses include lentils, chickpeas and mung beans. The project’s industry partner is pulse exporter Blue Ribbon Roasting Trading and Blue Ribbon Grains and Pulse.
The innovation partnerships program aims to support collaborative research and development projects involving both research organisations and industry to address industry and society issues in priority areas such as agriculture, engineering, climate change, clean energy, biotechnology and advanced manufacturing.
Other agricultural research related projects to receive funding include:
- A University of Queensland project led by Professor Murray Mitchell has received $250,000 to identify biomarkers that will allow the identification of tick resistant cattle. Ticks are a big problem to the cattle industry, with the hides of severely infested animals unsaleable. Cattle do build a degree of resistance to ticks over time, but some animals are better at this than others. Resistance to ticks appears to be intergenerational, but how resistance is achieved is not well known. This research project sets out to increase our knowledge, with major implications for the beef industry.The project’s industry partner is the Nindooinbah Pastoral Company.
- A QUT project, led by Associate Professor Robert Speight has been awarded $894,704. The project will establish Australia’s first biomanufacturing platform to develop animal feed supplements. Industry partners include Ridley AgriProducts, Kennedy Creek Lime, and Brisbane agribiotech success story Bioproton.
- A CSIRO project, led by Dr Laercio Porto-Neto, has been approved for funding of $750,000 to develop genomic selection methodologies to allow cost effective and sustainable improvements of feed efficiency for the first time in the Northern Australian beef cattle. Genomic selection is used to genotype a “reference” population of animals which are measured for a wide range of economically important traits. This research project could provide significant savings to the beef industry through reducing feedlot costs. Industry partners include the Australian Agricultural Company and the North Australian Pastoral Company;
- Another CSIRO project, this time led by Dr Melony Sellars, has been approved for funding of $650,000. The project will look at improving the annual productivity of the Queensland Black Tiger prawn industry. The project’s industry partners are Australian Prawn Farms, Pacific Reef Fisheries and Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture.
