Let's Hear It For Legumes!“Let’s hear it for legumes!” That’s the message from researchers at the John Innes Centre (JIC) on the Norwich Research Park, who want to bring legume crops such as peas, fieldbeans and chickpeas higher up the agenda of European agriculture. In a £9.8 million research project known as “Grain Legumes”, the JIC scientists will spend the next four years working with colleagues from 18 countries, providing new tools to help develop new varieties, and alternative methods of growing, treating, processing and using these crops. Legume crops seem like a farmer’s best friend, fixing nitrogen in the soil and therefore reducing the need for fertilisers. They are also a valuable break crop in the rotation, reducing the build up of weeds and pests in a field that has been used for growing cereals. Yet despite these advantages, just 5 % of Europe’s arable land is used to grow legume crops. The reluctance of farmers to grow these crops has been put down to problems with diseases such as root rot, and the natural design of the plant which means it often collapses under its own weight. The Grain Legumes partnership aims to help increase the production and use of these crops as part of a lower-input and sustainable agriculture system across Europe. To overcome the problems of disease, and to produce consistently higher yields, the team plans to use genetics and breeding, alongside new ideas about fundamental plant biology. They will contribute to an existing project to sequence the complete genetic code of “barrel medick”, an experimental plant that is currently providing many clues for the more complex crops like lentils and peas. Identifying the genes responsible for plant shape, disease and stress tolerance, and the protein contents of the seeds will be a crucial part of future work, which will feed into other studies using natural variants and targeted breeding programmes. But Grain Legumes isn’t just about how plants work. Their benefits as an animal feed will also be studied by nutritionists and economists, and novel feed processing methods will be tested to try and improve animal health. These initial studies will be done on pigs and salmon, where the team hope they can help solve the fish industry’s urgent need for alternative sources of protein. Critically, though, the project goes much wider than academic research. As well as Universities and research institutes, small industrial companies and user groups are included within the 50 participating organisations, spread over a range of European countries and even two labs in Australia. The idea is to incorporate expertise, skills and ideas from all over the EU to develop resources and infrastructure to develop grain legumes in order to grow them on a commercially viable basis. Currently Europe imports 70 % of its plant derived protein, mostly in the form of soya. Hopefully the findings of the Grain Legume consortium will generate more interest in legumes in general, so that we and our animals can enjoy home-grown varieties of these versatile crops in future. © Dr Belinda Clarke 2004 This Article originally appeared as part of the "Science on your Doorstep" series, published in the Eastern Daily Press, 24th April 2004
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