ISEA s.r.l.
ISEA Srl is a company based on research, a holding of Agroservice Spa., which possesses 99% of its corporate capital. Historically a cereal producing Italian company with main operating offices based at Agroservice, in the area of Rocchetta in San Severino Marche (in the province of Macerata), further to two peripheral operating seats: one at the Research Centre for Cereal Cultivation in Foggia (CREA-CI) and one at Contrada Sparagogna in Mineo, in Sicily.
Continual research on new vegetable varieties having better characteristics has long since been ISEA’s objective. The method generally applied in the research of new varieties is the so-called “pedigree method” which is based on the basic crossbreed and followed by a selection of the best genotypes of a cycle duration lasting several years.
Every year, ISEA starts a new cycle, carrying out about 100 basic crossbreed species and selecting about 1000 different line:
new varieties of straw cereals (soft and hard wheat, barley, triticale whole plants, barley and spelt)
new legume varieties (field bean, lupin, chick-peas, lentils, protein peas)
new varieties of oil-seeds (rapeseed, sunflower and safflower)
In all the types of research the main focus is to improve the different parameters like: the final yield, resistance to plant diseases and quality characteristics both in terms of technology and nutrition.
ISEA is equipped with a laboratory for the management of genetic materials and quality assessment, purity of the genes and germination of the seeds, as well as tools for the cultivation of plants in a monitored environment (climatic cells and new phytotrons recently installed). Moreover, it possesses many laboratory instruments useful in analysing the quality of the seed and the flours.
In terms of field experimentation ISEA avails itself of spacious premises provided by CERMIS (Centro ricerche e Sperimentazione per il Miglioramento Vegetale “N. Strampelli”) in Tolentino, near to Macerata, as far as the first generation in the selection is concerned. A series of open-air dislocated fields throughout the country deals with instead, assessing the agronomic and quality performance of the new lines during the advanced phase of selection.
ISEA deals with genetic improvement implementing different breeding programmes in the search for new line of seeds availing itself of better knowledge obtained from the scientific world regarding the genomic, amongst which the assisted selection by molecular markers. These programmes consist in a series of focus projects on selecting lines that present more stability and quality. The species concerned are: hard and soft wheat, barley, triticale whole plants, oats, spelt, field bean, peas, lupin, chick peas, lentils, vetch, Alfalfa, sunflower, rapeseed and safflower.
”Only with genetic improvements can agricultural products be innovative, such innovations and improvements that are indispensable in rendering agriculture competitive both in terms of earnings and-above all- enabling it to immediately meet with efficiency the different requirements of the market”
Over the last years ISEA has recently focused on:
• HARD FLOUR with the development of a specific supply chains, aimed at obtaining top quality varieties, characterised by high concentrations of gluten, protein concentration and yellow index. The varieties that have been developed totally meet the requirements of the pasta manufacturing companies and agriculturists, further to attaining excellent quality levels, a good level of yield has also been maintained;
• SOFT FLOUR with improvements in stronger varieties that not only stand out for their excellent quality levels (excellent rapport between W and P/L), but also for a higher average yield of the existing varieties today on the markets;
• BARLEY with improvements on varieties for zoo-technical use in winter and spring environments, in addition to malt-producing varieties.
A further objective of ISEA research is cereals resistance to plant diseases, in particular to fusariosis, rust and septoria. Thanks to the implementation of molecular markers some lines/varieties of hard and soft flour have to date been achieved that are interesting in terms of their resistance to such diseases.
ISEA has acquired over time significant competences in various fields:
- breeding of genetic material or under monitored conditions;
- selection of first generation lines;
- assisted selection of molecular markers;
- assessments on productive features, their resistance to pathogens and on quality;
- setting up of agronomic tests in different cultivation areas throughout the country and abroad;
- assessment of morphologic features with the aim of determining their stability and uniformity of the lines during the advanced stage of selection;
- maintenance of purity and multiplication of seeds of the best varieties;
- management of genetic material and documentation for subscription to Registro Nazionale delle Varietà agrarie (RNV-National Register for Agricultural Varieties).
In order to carry out these research activities, ISEA avails itself of a team of qualified breeders and qualified technicians.
Recently, ISEA has taken part in ‘Progetto Cluster SOFIA’ project , for having obtained an improved variety of wheat grains.
The project is involved in different ongoing partnerships with CREA, in particular ‘Centro di ricerca per la Cerealicoltura’ in Foggia (CREA-CI) that aims at developing a hard wheat flour variety, in cooperation with ‘Centro di Ricerca per la Genomica e la Bioinformatica’ in Fiorenzuola D’Arda (CREA-GB) in order to develop a winter barley variety for zoo-technical and malt use, with a Research Centre for the quality enhancement of cereals with ‘Qualitativa dei Cereali’ in Rome (CREA-IT) with the aim of developing monococcum variety of what grain and hard flour variety.
ISEA detains 84 Plant property rights and its enormous contribution for the spreading of hard flour in Italy has been acknowledged, thanks to the San Carlo variety, created in cooperation with the ‘Istituto di Ricerca Maliani Genetica’, and Creso variety.
THE PROCESSING OFTHE SEEDS AND CYCLE OF THE PRODUCT
