Australian native foods may one day make as big an impact on global cuisine as Australia's excellent table wines on the beverage market.

Although still very much in its infancy CSIRO's Dr Maarten Ryder says that the combination of promising world demand, the need to restore the Australian landscape and the requirements of good nutrition make native foods a strong bet for the future.

"At the moment most of our native food is wild-harvested. There are probably only a couple of hundred growers experimenting with farm production, and less than a dozen or so crops in the process of domestication.

"But overseas demand is very encouraging - stronger than local Australian demand, really. Then there is the need to develop more sustainable farming systems - and what could be better for that than native Australian crops and trees?"

Overseas demand, driven by the never-ending quest for novel culinary flavours, textures and aromas, is just starting to turn the spotlight on Australia as the last great unexplored continent from the perspective of novel fruits, seeds and condiments.

Dr Ryder will outline the latest prospects for a native foods industry, based on traditional Aboriginal knowledge of plants and foods, at the Desert Knowledge conference in Alice Springs tomorrow (August 29). Desert Knowledge is part of Outback central, the climax event of the Year of the Outback 2002.

"We are currently trialling native crops at eight sites - six in South Australia, one in Victoria and One in New South Wales. And we're about to start a new trial at Ceduna, on the Nullarbor," Dr Ryder explains.

"The crops under trial include the quandong, bush tomato, riberry, native citrus, mountain pepper, muntries, lemon myrtle and edible wattleseed."

The research aims to establish the requirements for orchard production of native crops - their soil, water, nutrient and pest control needs - and the best methods of producing them on a sustainable basis.

CSIRO has been involved in the domestication and improvement of quandong and native limes, Dr Ryder says.

"Ideally, we'd like to see several of these native crops grow to emulate the success of the macadamia industry which has already achieved more than 500 varieties. Except it would be nice if the initial work of domesticating them as crops happened in Australia, rather than Hawaii."

In the long run, Dr Ryder speculates, native foods could become as big an export success story as Australian wine - perhaps earning a billion dollars a year within a few decades.

"But there are many challenges to overcome before we get there," he says. "We need to domesticate, propagate, work out the best farming systems, develop food products and, most important of all, develop markets. These things must happen simultaneously."

There is even potential for a beverage industry based on native produce, ranging from fruit drinks to wines, beers and liqueurs made from plants such as native citrus, quandongs and aniseed myrtle.

As important as the economic prospects are the role native crops can play in making Australian farming systems more sustainable, by combating salinity, waterlogging, soil loss, acid soils and other environmental problems.

"We ought not to overlook the potential for nutritional and health benefits from our native grains and fruit. Aboriginal people have used plants from the Australian flora for their healing qualities as well as for food for millennia," Dr Ryder adds.

However he cautions producers about rushing headlong into native crops before markets and products are properly developed, to avoid the infant industry falling into the 'craze' pattern of so many new agricultural ventures.

"There's a lot of hard work to be done yet, and it's as much off the farm as it is on the farm."

More information:

Dr Maarten Ryder, CSIRO Land and Water, 08 8303 8534, mobile: 0409 696360
Email: Maarten.Ryder@csiro.au

Margaret Bryant, CSIRO Land and Water, 08 9333 6215, mobile: 0417 247 241
Email: Margaret.Bryant@csiro.au