Almost 900 registrants which includes wheat breeders, geneticists and scientists have gathered for the inaugural Congress, which is a combination of two previous events.

“It brings together scientists working on drought tolerance and chatting with those people working in end-use quality and production agriculture,” says Dr. Curtis Pozniak, a wheat and durum breeder at the University of Saskatchewan’s Crop Development Centre. “The idea is that we all come together as a global research community and discuss some of the major challenges that we face.”

There will be formal presentations and field tours during the six day event, which will leave plenty of time for informal discussions between the delegates.

“Some of the best parts of the meeting are the events where we have time to communicate one-on-one with potential new collaborators that might be doing some new work that we haven’t even thought of,” says Pozniak.

Wheat is an important global crop, providing an estimated 20 percent of global calories and protein.

“Anything that we can do as scientists to improve yields, disease resistance and overall quality and nutrition, will go a long way to help global food security.”