04/30/08 Northwest growers visit CYMMT

Farm and Ranch April 30, 2008 A group of Washington Wheat Commissioners and Washington State University wheat breeders and researchers recently visited CYMMT in Mexico. Randy Suess, one of the Commissioner/growers on the trip, explains what CYMMT is and why it is of interest to producers here. Suess: "CYMMT is an international research program down in Obregon, Mexico and their main purpose is to help wheat research for all the starving countries in the world. And you might say well how does that really affect us and our industry? They are really doing some interesting research down there that we could really piggyback on and it is like drought resistance. I think everyone would be in favor of coming up with some wheat that is really drought tolerant. They are also working on a lot of rust resistance down there because we just keep getting new strains of rust. Of course they are working on Ug99 which doesn't look like it is going to be a big issue for the PNW but could be for the rest of the United States. So I really think there are some opportunities there." Opportunities for joint research projects. Suess: "It works actually both ways. They not only are looking for us to kick some money in their way to fund some of the research they are doing, but also they are looking to pick WSU's brains on some stuff that WSU doing that maybe they could use and help them out on the research they are doing." Another grower Wheat Commissioner on the trip to CYMMT was Curtis Hennings. His comments tomorrow. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.