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The National Variety Trials (NVT) aims to generate independent information for growers about newly released crop varieties. This is a change in focus from the previous Crop Variety Trials (CVT), which included the aiding of public breeders in making their variety release decisions.
The change from the previous testing system has been driven by the increasing commercial focus of plant breeding programs in Australia. The NVT System has been developed to complement the plant breeding programs. Breeders will make their release decisions prior to nominating lines for testing in the program. NVT will only be testing lines very close to commercial release.
NVT involves establishing trial sites according to agreed protocols. Its contracted service providers manage the trials to ensure the collection of accurate data into a single database.
The program was established in 2005 by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) and is managed by the Australian Crop Accreditation System Limited (ACAS). It is a national program of comparative crop variety testing with standardised trial management, data generation, collection and dissemination. This is managed through an internet accessed database that ensures a common approach and uniformity across the system.
NVT Online is the delivery system for the data. It is an easy-to-use searchable database.
More than 630 trials are sown at over 250 locations each year in the NVT system. Crops tested are: Wheat; Barley; Triticale; Oat; Canola; Lupin; Lentil; Field Pea; Faba Bean and Chickpea.
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