This year, Canadian farmers seeded more than 14 million acres of canola and dozens of new varieties.
every crop under the sun,” but quick- ly selected rapeseed as, virtually, the single crop capable of being adapted and grown on large areas of the prai- rie. In fact, there was one other possible
choice — hemp — which grows read- ily in this part of the world. There is good oil in hemp, Dr. Stefansson said. But hemp is also the source of cannabis, a narcotic, and therefore, in any form, is a product the authorities would look on with suspicion. Rapeseed in those days was not
considered satisfactory for human consumption. Nutritionists told Dr. Stefansson that they did not like the erucic acid in the crop. This substance was known to deposit fat in the heart and other vital organs of rats. The young scientist thereupon
launched a worldwide search for a rapeseed with a lower erucic acid content in its oil, he surveyed over 4,000 varieties and homed in on a European forage rape, Liho. Liho’s erucic acid content varied
widely. Through breeding and selec- tion, using Liho as a parent, Dr. Stefansson and a colleague found they could virtually eliminate erucic acid from rapeseed oil through the use of two of Liho’s genes. If there was one key to Dr. Stefans-
son’s achievement, it was his method- ical approach to his task, and above all, the fact that he chose to have a chemist working full-time at his side during the selection process. Through the use of a gas chro-
matograph — the first such instru- ment to be used in a plant laboratory
28 • Fall 2016
Dr. Baldur Stefansson.
(it was originally used for oil testing by the petroleum industry), Dr. Stefans- son was able to test the thousands of rape plants to find the plant that would meet his requirements. In 1961, Dr. Stefansson and his team showed the world their first erucic-free product. It would be another 13 years, howev-
er, before a commercially acceptable, high-yield product, bearing the two Liho genes and carrying the name, Tower, would be ready for market. The University of Manitoba, deliver-
ing his award years later, took special note of his methods. “Dr. Stefansson had the wisdom and foresight to realize that, in order to make the modifications required for oilseed rape to be widely accepted, he would require the collabo- ration of others, including chemists, nutritionists, agronomists and other plant breeders. It was an exciting time to be working in plant sciences here,” Dr. McGinnis recalls. These were interesting times at
the University of Manitoba lab. They hosted industrial and science represen- tatives from around the world. This included visitors from the European industrial giant Unilever, who couldn’t quite understand what the Manitoba scientists were trying to accomplish. When Tower arrived, crushers were that
adamant the disdained designa-
tion, “rapeseed”, would not be accept- able for this new quality variety. “Can you imagine
trying to market low-
erucic-level rapeseed?”, Dr. Stefansson asked wryly at the time. It would have to have a new name. “Canola” would be just fine. During this same period, Dr.
Prairie gold. The lovely canola flower.
Stefansson was working to reduce the level of glucosinolate in rape meal feed to animals, to give this oilseed by-product a boost in the marketplace. Glucosinolate levels in rape meal were at the time considered toxic, or at least harmful, limiting its use as animal feed (The same glucosinolate is present in mustard and radishes and deemed to be hot but harmless for human consump- tion.) By 1974 Dr. Stefansson had located
the low-glucosinolate gene he sought and bred it, too, into his new Tower variety. With Tower, Manitoba at last had a quality, commercially viable rape- seed product for both humans and animals. Over the next five years rapeseed on the prairies went
production
through its great transformation, as Dr. Stefansson personally took to the highways to talk to growers about the oilseed product. His task was to convince rapeseed growers, then plant- ing some four million acres of rape- seed, to switch over to canola so that the quality of Canada’s oilseed product could be established and sustained. By 1980, the conversion was
complete, and canola was rapidly catch- ing on as a lucrative cash crop. By the mid-1980s, when Dr. Stefansson retired, canola acreage was approach- ing 14 million. By the mid-1980s
too, using the
Manitoba technique and the precious Liho genes, the Europeans had adapted their own rapeseed varieties and were beginning to market their own qual- ity oil, adopting the standards set in Canada.
localgardener.net
PHOTO ICELANDIC ASSOCIATION
Photo by Richard Bartz.
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