Post 54. Wheat: key facts

 

Wheat: a crucial crop in the food conversation

The wheat we grow and mill/process today comes from the ancient cereal grains produced for millennia. We harvest (combine) the seeds and then either feed them to animals or process them into different types of animal feeds with other ingredients, or mill the wheat into flour. We use different types of wheat to make different types of flour and then a range of bakery products and also pasta (durum wheat). Most of the wheat grown on the planet is from a common domesticated wheat species (Triticum aestivum).

Over the centuries, wheat varieties have been selected for their ability to grow well in certain locations, the products that can be produced from them in terms of their quality and flavour, the resistance they have to disease, and drought. UK flour millers characterise the different kinds of wheat and work with the plant breeders to develop new varieties for the future.

UK flour millers say that 85% of the milling wheat used in the UK is grown in the UK.[1] This will change from year to year depending on the weather and disease challenges and their impact.

In the UK, wheat is the most commonly grown arable crop on farms - either planted in the winter, winter wheat or the spring, spring wheat. From the 1850's wheat yields (per hectare of land) steadily increased with the adoption of new varieties and production methods including mechanisation.[2] However the growth in yields has levelled off, what some describe as the wheat yield plateau. 

There is much research at farm business scale and within universities and research institutes to determine what has caused the plateau and how we continue to grow wheat into the future, especially with the recent rises in fossil fuel derived fertiliser prices which affects economic viability. A really interesting area of research, and really needed right now.

[1] https://www.ukflourmillers.org/wheat

[2] https://esd.copernicus.org/preprints/esd-2021-92/esd-2021-92.pdf