New research project aims to kickstart domestic chickpea production

The project will also look at the possibility of displacing chickpea imports through domestic production, as the UK currently imports 60,000 tonnes of chickpeas a year for products such as stand-alone tins, pouches of cooked produce and packets of dried pulses, alongside use as ingredient in ready meals and bakery products.

The study, titled ‘Cicero – developing chickpea as a novel source of domestic UK protein’, has been awarded £500,000 in funding by Defra under the ‘Farming Futures R&D Fund: Sustainable farm-based protein’ competition, part of the Farming Innovation Programme managed by Innovate UK.

As a nitrogen-fixing legume, chickpea has the potential to reduce on-farm fertiliser use and greenhouse gas emissions associated with fertiliser production and application.

Moreover, current domestic legume production is primarily restricted to field beans and combinable peas, with a large proportion of these crops destined for animal feed. In contrast, chickpea is a commonly used food item but is rarely grown in the UK, largely due to a lack of varieties suitable for our climate and insufficient knowledge of the crop.

Project lead and NIAB’s Head of Breeding Dr Phil Howell explains the study will take a multi-faceted approach. Variety trials and agronomy testing will be carried out by NIAB and specialist seed company Premium Crops, ranging from small plots up to field-scale evaluation.

Whereas, end-use quality assessments will be undertaken by Norfolk-based grower Place UK, who has successfully grown chickpea crops to sell through its vertically-integrated food ingredients business.

“Whilst the two-year project timescale prohibits a full breeding cycle, new populations will be advanced rapidly through the glasshouse, with selections ready for their first field evaluation by spring 2025,” Dr Howell said.

“NIAB has already assembled a diverse collection of chickpea material, which will be evaluated in field nurseries over the project duration. These will be complemented by a unique population of novel induced variants developed together with biotechnology start-up Viridian Seeds.

“These new sources of diversity will all feed into a second cycle of new crosses to kickstart the development of UK-adapted material,” Dr Howell added.

He went on to point out that chickpeas represent the challenges the UK legume sector is facing, with manufacturers relying on imports to meet increasing demands of plant-based foods.

Although chickpeas can be grown in the UK, crop yield and quality have so far been inconsistent as current varieties are not well-adapted to commercial production.

“Ultimately, we need better varieties bred specifically for UK conditions, but we also need to improve our agronomy know-how to get the most out of varieties – now and in the future,” Dr Howell concluded.