Canadian Pulse Quality

A World Leader

Canada is one of the largest producers of pulses and is the global leader in pulse exports. As the demand for plant protein has increased globally, Canada has emerged as a hub for pulse value-added processing, including milling and fractionation.

Investing in Sustainable Growth and a Healthy Future

Canada has invested in the infrastructure and knowledge to develop a robust pulse and pulse ingredient industry, including the development and promotion of sustainable production practices and a thorough understanding of Canadian variety quality and functional attributes.

In addition to Pulse Canada’s staff expertise, multiple Canadian institutions and academic researchers have specific expertise in the nutrition, health and sustainability attributes of pulses, their functional properties in food and non-food applications, as well as pulse processing technology.

Pulse Variety Trials

The Canadian pulse industry has established a four year project to gain a deep understanding of the impact of genetics and the local growing environment on pulse attributes that are key to today’s use as functional food ingredients.

Not only is it important to gain an understanding of the natural variability in quality for Canadian varieties, variations in these quality parameters are especially important to processors as they can affect the processability, yield and quality of the derived ingredients.

Year 1 - 2019

Ten Canadian yellow pea varieties were grown across ten locations in the Canadian prairies in triplicate. Analysis of variance demonstrated significant (p < 0.05) effects of variety, location and a variety x location interaction on all parameters measured.

With the exception of fat, location accounted for the largest proportion of variance for all parameters; ranging from 59% for amylose content to 98% for moisture content. The results suggest that the effect of location, which takes into consideration the influence of agronomic practices and environmental conditions, has a marked effect on the quality traits of yellow peas grown in Canada. Although contributing to a lesser proportion of parameter variance, significant (p<0.05) differences were observed between varieties across the ten field sites.

For more information on the trial results, including variety specific data, please contact us.

Year 2 -2020

The analysis was expanded to include total starch content, complete mineral profile and trypsin inhibitor activity. Results are expected by May 2021.

Backed by Results

Every year, the Canadian Grain Commission collects samples from Canadian producers in order to evaluate crop harvest quality for the growing season. The historical data that is collected provides a great indicator of natural variability that may occur for Canadian produced peas and lentils.