Quality of malting barley grain in the Czech Republic, crop 2023

Abstract

The quality parameters of 243 malting barley samples were evaluated according to the standard ČSN 46 1100-5 from the 2023 harvest. The quality of the 2023 harvest can generally be characterised by a lower nitrogen content in the grain with a relatively wide range of values from 7.8 % to 13.7 % and lower values of sieving fractions above the 2.5 mm sieve, which averaged 87.2 %. The lower content of grain admixtures unusable for malting is favourable. Unfortunately, some of the barley was affected by precipitation, which came in the form of thunderstorms prior to harvest, but mainly by the rainfall that fell in the first decade of August and interrupted the harvest. This rainfall led to microbiological infestation of the barley and to the risk of reduced or lost germination due to the presence of sprouted grains, as confirmed by 54 % of the samples in which hidden sprouting was identified.