CONSUMER NEWS

from Buy Australian August September 2022 Issue

AUSSIE PETS

HOPES FOR A HAT TRICK

FORECAST RECORD AUSTRALIAN WINTER CROP PLANTING SEES POTENTIAL FOR THIRD CONSECUTIVE BUMPER HARVEST

Australia is laying the groundwork for a third consecutive bumper harvest, with this year’s total planted crop area forecast to reach a record 23.83 million hectares, Rabobank says in its just-released 2022/23 Winter Crop Outlook. This would be nearly one per cent up on last year’s record planting and 11 per cent above the five-year average. It includes a 1.4 per cent lift in wheat and a record canola planting, up 20.9 per cent on last year, albeit at the expense of barley, oats and pulses. In a year of global shortages and high commodity prices – the forecast record planting comes as global markets look to Australia to deliver a “hat trick of great grain and oilseed production” at a time when poor production and export constraints in a number of countries are prompting the United Nations to warn that the world is on the brink of a food crisis.

GO AUSSIES GO !!!!

MALES NEED NOT APPLY

A unique all-female species of grasshopper that can reproduce without sex provides fascinating insights into evolution, new research led by the University of Melbourne has found. Published today in Science, the research shows the Australian grasshopper Warramaba virgo (W. virgo) – a parthenogenetic species, meaning it can reproduce asexually by cloning itself – was just as ecologically successful as its counterparts that breed by sex. Lead author Professor Michael Kearney said “Parthenogenetic species in theory should be suffering from parasites and a high load of bad mutations. Our study finds no disadvantage to W. virgo.” Co-author Professor Ary Hoffmann said sexual reproduction could be costly. “Finding a mate takes time and energy and comes with an increased risk of predation. If we can do away with males and still have viable offspring and the species thrives, then why do we bother with sex at all?” Professor Hoffmann said. The W. virgo is estimated to have evolved from a hybrid mating between two other grasshopper species (W. whitei and W. flavolineata) more than 250 thousand years ago.