The Australian sweet potato industry is benefiting from a systematic approach to managing viruses. As far back as the 1980s, Queensland scientists realised that Sweetpotato Feathery Mottle Virus (SPFMV) infected almost all sweetpotato crops in commercial production.
Over the next 20 years, it became apparent that yields and quality were being severely compromised by these infections. Researchers and the sweet potato industry, decided to do something about it, and the result has been a very positive story of collaborative industry development.
Starting around 2001, Queensland scientists successfully adapted and commercialised a scheme to remove known viruses from sweet potato cultivars, and then quickly multiply those pathogen-tested, mother sweet potatoes, to generate planting material for 95 per cent of the Australian industry.
It’s no coincidence that during the ensuing 15 years, the industry value has increased at around 17pc per annum to be currently worth about $90 million per year at the farm gate.
Through the support of the Australian Sweet potato Grower organisation (ASPG), Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF) and Horticulture Innovation Australia (HIA), scientists and industry continue to ramp up the battle against sweet potato viruses.
Queensland DAF horticulturist Sandra Dennien said researchers have great resources, great scientists and access to great growers
"Using our new qPCR machine, we’ve been able to establish which viruses the industry currently has, and develop better ways of managing them in commercial production," Ms Dennien said.
"As far as we can detect, the sweet potato seed roots currently being supplied to growers are free of important sweet potato viruses, and the systems growers are using to then generate cuttings on their farms are still pretty effective."
As a result, Australian sweet potato yields are the highest achieved commercially anywhere in the world.
Ms Dennien double checks the lab results by observing symptoms on indicator plants in glasshouses at the DAF Gatton Research Facility.
She is recognised as a world authority on the indexing method and is in regular communications with experts at international universities and research centres.
"Indexing is very time consuming, but we need to be absolutely sure that our lab procedures are as reliable as they can be because viruses in sweet potato plants are very hard to detect, so using indicator plants is still our most certain technique for virus diagnostics," she said.
"Developing lab diagnostics that can be equally reliable is a real priority for our current research."
