Ron Beatson has spent most of his career as a scientist researching and breeding hops. Photo: Plant & Food Research
Plant & Food New Zealand scientist Dr Ron Beatson was recently awarded the Morton Coutts Trophy at the Brewers Guild of NZ 2021 NZ Beer Awards in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the NZ hops industry. Colin Williscroft reports.
Being awarded the Morton Coutts Trophy, which celebrates the New Zealand inventor who revolutionised the science of brewing through the continuous fermentation method, is not the only industry recognition Ron Beatson has received in recent years.
Last year he was honoured through the naming of NZ’s latest hop cultivar, Nectaron, which gets its name from combining ‘nectar of the gods’ with Beatson’s Christian name, acknowledging his almost four decades of service to the hop industry.
Hop growing has gone from strength to strength in NZ in recent years, with it now supporting a burgeoning export industry.
It’s a far cry from when Beatson first got involved.
Beatson, who has led the research and development of hop breeding and genetics at Plant & Food Research for 38 years, had his first taste of hop growing after doing a PhD in agronomy and crop science at North Carolina State University.
Bonded to return to NZ, he was asked to call into the United States’ Pacific Northwest on his way back, a region known for its hops.
Although born and raised in the Motueka area, so had been aware of hops from his childhood, it was in the Pacific Northwest where he began to learn more about hops.
It was the start of an illustrious career that has included being involved in the research, development and commercial release of 16 specialty hop cultivars that have put NZ on the world hops stage.
Beatson says in the 1970s and 80s hops were just a cottage industry in NZ, with the focus mainly on breeding hops for local beer consumers.
It’s grown dramatically in the past three or four years, having quadrupled in size, with corporates replacing mum and dad farmers.
He says one of the reasons behind that growth is the hop cultivars that have been produced.
“They’ve got unique flavours and they’re fetching good prices at the premium end of the craft brewing market, particularly in America but also in other countries like Australia, Japan and the UK,” Beatson said.
“We concentrated on cultivating hops with good flavour.
“We’re able to concentrate on the flavour and agronomics of the plant rather than diseases because we don’t have the major pests and diseases that affect other hop growing areas in the world.”
Beatson says most NZ hops have rich, fruity flavours.
“There’s one called Nelson Sauvin, which has been the backbone of the industry for the past couple of decades,” he said.
That hop, which he says has grapey-type aromas, got its name from sauvignon blanc, although it has other flavours as well.
The most recent NZ hop, released in 2020, is the aforementioned Nectaron, which is expected to be in great demand globally.
“It looks like Nectaron’s going to be a real hit with brewers,” he said.
Hops are not native to NZ, but Beatson says a lot have been imported into the country during the last 150 years, with those genetics used to improve the product and develop our own selections, which have adapted to the climate here.
Although the principles of hop breeding have remained the same, he says the science behind them has become much more technical.
“If you want to develop a new cultivar you’ve still got to do a cross of two parents, grow the seedling out and then do a selection amongst them, that part hasn’t really changed,” he said.
“But how you do it has, we’ve got a lot more mechanised with our evaluations now.”
The Motueka Research Centre where Beatson is based also has a small brewing plant.
“We use it as a selection tool and every week we test around 18 to 20 beers. They’re all different hop selections,” he said.
“It sounds like drinking beer – not a bad job to have – but it’s a bit more than that.”
Beatson says new cultivar releases are always very rewarding, with Nelson Sauvin and Nectaron two standouts for him.
“One of the highlights of being a plant breeder is seeing the fruits of your labour, from the crosses through to the cultivars and then getting it successfully commercialised.
“It’s a long process. It can take a good 10 years to release a cultivar,” he said.
“And even once it’s released the industry has to accept it.
“You can breed good selections but if the brewers don’t want them, they don’t have much of a future.”
One of the challenges the hop growing industry faces is expanding from its current base in the Nelson/Tasman region.
“The challenge is going to be finding locations that are ideally suited. It’s climatic,” he said.
“Hops don’t like wind so there are many areas of NZ that are not going to be suitable unless you’ve got good protection, like shelter belts.
“Another challenge is to make sure we keep developing.
“It’s a fashion business, hops; what might be popular this year might not be in five years.
“You’ve got to be prepared for that and make sure you’ve got good selection processes in place, good research objectives and make sure you can achieve them, having different flavours coming through.
“You’ve got to have good agronomics, that’s a big part of our programme, making sure the growers are happy.”
NZ only produces around 1% of the world’s hop crop and Beatson says there’s no point trying to compete with the big players.
“We have to make sure we’re not in the same space as the American and German producers, who produce about three-quarters of the world’s crop between them,” he said.
“We don’t want to be in their space in terms of developing hop cultivars that have got similar trends to what they have.
“We want to have something unique.
“How we get there is the big challenge. How do you do it and make sure you’ve got a different flavour?”
Beatson is about to retire but he’s confident there’s a bright future for hops research in NZ, which is good news for those of us who enjoy the fruits of those labours.
Cheers, Ron.
