Searching for an alternative oil crop for organic farming systems in temperate climates

Summary

Safflower is an oil crop widely grown in semiarid and arid regions whose oil is valuable because of its high concentration of polyunsaturated fatty acids. The aim of this contribution is to give an overview of the methods for identifying potential genotypes suitable for cultivation in temperate climates. From 2002 to 2005 a great many safflower accessions from a worldwide safflower collection were screened at several locations in Germany and Switzerland. More than 75 % of the accessions tested failed under the humid conditions of the first year because they did not set seed. During 2004 and 2005, seed yield per row and oil content from 486 tested accessions varied between 0 and 428 g and between 0 and 21 %, respectively. Twenty selected accessions showed seed yields between 1.4 and 2.1 t ha-1 and oil contents ranging between 21 and 23 %. Although yield potential of given accessions was strongly dependent upon climatic factors, well adapted safflower accessions for more humid conditions were identified. For future research there are several agronomic challenges to be solved for cultivating safflower in organic farming systems, such as increasing oil content and optimizing weed and disease control.