Texas Tech hosts first Global Sorghum Conference held in the U.S.

LUBBOCK, Texas (KVII) — Texas Tech University is hosting the first Global Sorghum Conference in the United States this week at the Lubbock Civic Center, bringing together producers, researchers and industry representatives from Texas and around the world.

Attendees are discussing challenges facing sorghum growers, including water scarcity, crop resilience and the need to produce enough food to meet future demand.

“We have folks from France and South Africa, and we’re all growing sorghum,” said Scott Irlbeck, a Swisher County farmer. “We’re all kind of looking for the same goals when it comes to increasing profits and meeting a growing demand for the uses of sorghum.”

Conference organizers said discussions are focused on increasing yields, improving the crop’s ability to withstand stress and expanding markets for grain and silage sorghum.

“How can we increase sorghum production and increase yield?” said Monty Christian, chair of the Global Sorghum Conference. “How can we make sorghum more resilient to withstand stresses? From grain sorghum to silage sorghum, there is a lot of interest in silage sorghum within the High Plains area.”

Kansas leads the nation in sorghum production, averaging about 167 million bushels annually. Texas producers average about 75 million bushels a year.

Krishna Jagadish, a professor and director of the Davis College Water Center at Texas Tech, said growers must find ways to improve production while using less water.

“To increase sorghum production, you want to be more competitive with yield potential and look for diversified markets,” Jagadish said. “We have a lot of land here, but the amount of water is declining, and we also have competing crops.”

Irlbeck said expanding demand could make sorghum a more profitable option for producers.

“I think what we are trying to do with sorghum is make it a more valuable crop and try to increase demand for it, because when you have increased demand, that’s what brings the prices up,” he said.

The conference is scheduled to conclude Friday with tours of farms in Plainview, where researchers and producers will have an opportunity to view sorghum fields across the South Plains.

Texas Tech hosts first U.S. Global Sorghum Conference in Lubbock (KVII)