Australia & Japan: Australia is growing malting barley variety Lofty Nijo for Japan supply
ABB Grain Ltd announced on May 12 that growers are again being sought to participate in growing the malting barley variety Lofty Nijo, with ABB Grain offering a A$20/t premium for malting quality Lofty Nijo delivered for the 2005/06 season.
Lofty Nijo was bred in collaboration with the University of Adelaide and Sapporo Breweries in Japan.
Since 2003/04 ABB has been part of a program working with growers to produce Lofty Nijo in larger commercial quantities, with a view of making the variety commercially available to all growers. So far results have been good with growers primarily in the mid-north and south east of the state participating.
The program involves seed being purchased through ABB in a closed loop arrangement, where all production is returned to Sapporo via ABB and Joe White Maltings. All grain produced must be sold back to ABB – a $20/t premium above the Gairdner malting 1 price is offered for all malting 1 quality deliveries of Lofty Nijo. The malting barley is then malted by Joe White Maltings before being exported to Japan for brewing.
As has been the case in previous years, it is anticipated that a Lofty Nijo malting barley segregation will be available at Port Adelaide for 2005/06 deliveries (this will be confirmed closer to harvest). Feed quality Lofty Nijo can be delivered to any feed segregation as feed barley, but is also required to be sold back to ABB under the closed loop arrangement.
Growers participating in the program are required by Sapporo to keep a crop diary for traceability purposes, recording all of the steps that have been taken to produce the grain.
Delivery specifications are as per Gairdner malting barley specifications for 2005.
While not yielding quite as well as Gairdner (Lofty Nijo has a similar yield to Schooner), Lofty Nijo has shown the ability to make malting grade more readily than Gairdner. Its maturity is around 10-14 days earlier than that of Gairdner and a plumper grain size is generally produced.
Lofty Nijo is not efficient on zinc deficient soils, and is susceptible to CCN, scald and both forms of net blotch.
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