A team of researchers from University of Queensland have revealed a scientific breakthrough has resulted in a new type of sorghum.

This discovery, in turn could also see the prices of eggs and meat on supermarket shelves reduce.

UQ professor Ian Goodwin said he and his team have been working on increasing the grain’s protein content for the past decade, and they now believe they can grow a variety of sorghum that has 15 per cent protein – a significant difference considering most Australian varieties contain closer to 10 per cent.

Speaking with abc.net.au he said this 50 per cent increase meant poultry and pork producers would be able to replace soybean meal, another source of protein that was much more expensive.

“If we take a meat chicken, if you look at current prices, the price of soybean meal per tonne is about three-and-a-half to four times what sorghum is,” he said.

“If you can take more than half of that soybean meal out of the diet, you’re going to be producing a tonne of feed at substantially cheaper amounts.

“It should be a cheaper meat product, or it will be used for poultry layers as well, so it should mean the feed costs in poultry layers go down as well.”

Prof Godwin said he was hoping to grow the first commercial high-protein sorghum crop this year and expects interest to grow.

“It would increase the demand for Australian sorghum not just here but probably internationally,” he said.

Sorghum has been gaining popularity in recent years as a gluten-free alternative to wheat. ranked as the world’s fifth most important cereal crop, it’s durable, drought-tolerant, can survive cooler weather and can also grow in high rainfall areas.