OBJECTIVES
ORIGIN
PARTICIPATION STRUCTURE
ACTIVITIES DURING 2008
ACTIVITIES DURING LAST YEARS
INFORMATION ON THE EC FUNDED RESEARCH ACTIVITIES
PUBLICATIONS

Breeding for quality criteria and adaptation to mediterranean-climate conditions, grain legumes and cereals.

CIHEAM activity in grain legumes (chickpeas and faba bean) since the 1980s. Activities in durum wheat since 1990. All these activities are carried out in collaboration with CIMMYT and ICARDA.

Algeria	ITGC, Alger, Constantine
Egypt	Minist. Agric, Dokki, Cairo
Spain	Univ. Córdoba, Barcelona, Lérida, Madrid, IRTA Lérida
Finland	MTT
France	ITCF Paris, INRA-ENSA Montpellier, FERT
Jordan	University of Jordan
Italy	ISC Foggia, Rome, Catania. Univ. Viterbo
Lebanon	LARI
Morocco	IAV Hassan II, Rabat, INRAM Rabat,Meknès
Netherlands	Wageningen Univ.
Portugal	ENMP, Elvas
Tunisia	INRAT Tunis, INAT Tunis, ISA chott Meriem
Turkey	Univ. Antalya, Izmir,  FCIC Ankara
UK	Univ. of Nottingham

ICARDA, CIMMYT, FAO

ACTIVITIES DURING LAST YEARS

Research projects under FP5 and FP6 programms of the EC:

i)Mapping Adaptation of Barley to Drought Environments (MABDE). RTD Project submitted in April 2002 and approved for funding. 2003 - 2007.

ii)Consultative Workshop on Participatory Plant Breeding (CONPAB). Specific Support Action submitted in March 2003 and approved for funding. 2004 - 2005.

iii)Management Improvements of WUE and NUE of Mediterranean Strategic Crops - Wheat and Barley (WatNitMed). 2005 - 2008.

Submission of a proposal for EC F7 call during 2007.

Eucarpia Cereal Section Meeting: “Cereal Science and Technology for Feeding 10 Billion People: Genomics Era and Beyond”. Lleida, Spain, 13-17 November 2006. Organised by Eucarpia, IRTA and CIHEAM. The meeting was structured around several topics: Biodiversity of useful genes / Marker assisted selection / Biotic and abiotic stresses / Quality of grains / Breeding for sustainable production / Gene expression / Plant growth and development.

173 participants from 31 European and non-European countries participated in the Meeting

Data analysis Workshop on Genetic diversity of global genetic resources organised by IPGRI-CGIAR within the framework of the Challenge Programme. GENERATION Subprogramme I. IAMZ June 21-25, 2004.
The data analysis workshop gathered 31 participants from France, Syria, Mexico, Philippines, Australia, Spain, Colombia, UK, Brazil, India, Peru, Kenia, Nigeria and Uganda. Most were scientists from the consortium, directly involved in germplasm identification and molecular analysis. Initially planned to allow practise of various pieces of software to analyse a first batch of genotyping data, the workshop left room for wider discussions on Subprogramme 1, its organisation and its evolution. A first day was devoted to exposing the audience to a range of examples of association studies, selected to illustrate the type of samples that present particular interest for this approach. Two half-day sessions were devoted to a review of the progress for each of the eleven crops represented. Two half-day sessions were kept for participants to test various softwares, with the guidance of several advisers. Two half-day discussion sessions highlighted several issues. A half day was devoted to various business, communication and consultation of the participants regarding priorities for commissioned research.

Meeting of the Scientific Committee of the 3rd Mediterranean Symposium on “No Tillage” (zaragoza, 23 - 25 March 2006), Organized By CIHEAM, FERT, Agrocont and ICARDA.
The potential of Conservation Agriculture attracts an increasing number of Farmers and Research Institutes in the Mediterranean basin. Whilst already widely used in some countries such as Spain, and are gradually being developed in others, these production systems based on « Direct Seeding » still require numerous adaptations to Mediterranean agroclimatic conditions, since the existing references come mainly from other regions of the world. 166 persons from 10 Mediterranean countries participated in the meeting, that was structured on 4 sessions on technical, environmental, socio-economic and development aspects of No-tillage.

Activities to be developed within the framework of the three INCO Med Actions

2nd International Conference on Integrated Approaches to Sustain and Improve Plant Production under Drought (Interdrought-II). Rome, Italy, 24-28 September 2005.
The objective of INTERDROUGHT-II is to serve as a platform for presenting and debating key issues and strategies relevant for increasing the yield and stability of crops under drought conditions by genetic and crop management approaches. Great advances were made in recent years in understanding the molecular basis of plant response and plant tolerance to drought stress. Hundreds of drought responsive genes were identified and the function of some has been resolved at the cellular level. Despite this, a huge gap remains between the findings at the molecular level and the application of this knowledge at the whole plant level in the field. Excellent meetings have been dedicated to the cellular and molecular aspects of drought stress. However, there is now an increasing demand in both public and private research sectors for crosstalk between disciplines involved with the molecular sciences and those seeking practical solutions to improve crop performance under drought conditions.Sessions will be on Improving yield under water-limited conditions – soil and crop management, Improving yield and sustainability under water-limited agriculture, Molecular and physiological bases of plant adaptation to drought, Genes to support plant performance under water-limited conditions, Integrating whole plant and molecular approaches to improve drought tolerance and Future challenges and opportunities

INFORMATION ON THE EC FUNDED RESEARCH ACIVITIES

INFORMATION ON THE EC FUNDED RESEARCH ACTIVITIES

i) Mapping Adaptation of Barley to Drought Environments (MABDE). (2003 - 2007)

http://www.iamz.ciheam.org/mabde

Project abstract

Barley is the predominant crop in the driest land areas throughout the Mediterranean, being annually grown on 15 million ha. Grain yields are particularly affected by drought. The main objective of this proposal is to understand the genetic and physiological dynamics and processes underlying adaptation to drought. Novel materials will be developed and studied across a wide range of Mediterranean drought-prone environments throughout Europe, North Africa and West Asia. Contemporary genetics and plant physiology tools will be used in order to formulate a germplasm improvement strategy for water use efficiency under rainfed Mediterranean environments.

General objective

The main objective of this proposal is to understand the genetic and physiological dynamics and processes underlying (1) barley domestication and adaptation to drought and (2) intensive barley breeding carried out in the last century. Contemporary genetics and plant physiology tools will be used in order to formulate a germplasm improvement strategy for water use efficiency under rainfed Mediterranean environments.

Specific objectives

• Characterise and use a series of adaptation mechanisms to cope with drought:
  • Capture and identify naturally occurring variation for adaptation to arid Mediterranean environments at both the nuclear and cytoplasmic level.
  • Understand basic underlying physiological mechanisms of adaptation to drought, resulting in improved water use efficiency, over and above phenology.
  • Build on competencies in traditional mapping that take advantage of recombination in several backgrounds over many generations to identify and confirm candidate genomic regions associated with yield under drought.
  • Assess the role of candidate genes for adaptation emerging from genomic and physiological studies of model and related species.
  • Develop new integrative models for GE and QTLxE based on extensive multilocation yield data supplemented with genetical, physiological and environmental information.
• Develop new genetic material to test and validate the role of nuclear and cytoplasmic genes in adaptation to drought.

Expected results

• The joint effort of the consortium will result in the generation of extensive genotypic and phenotypical data sets to be used for genetic and association studies in barley breeding for drought-prone areas throughout the Mediterranean. This would be the single largest effort to address such a critical issue, including more than 500 genotypes characterised with a common set of molecular markers, and grown and studied across more than 20 experiments over sites and years
• This study will deliver new tools, targets and novel genetic materials for the study of adaptation of barley to drought.
• Appropriate statistical methods for assessing marker-trait associations will be assessed for various types of response variables and marker systems.
• Appropriate statistical methods for integrated (analytical) Genotype x Environment interaction analysis.
• Target regions of the genome that can be used to search germplasm collections for novel but natural variants of potential benefit in breeding for drought-prone environments.
• Formulation of a germplasm improvement strategy for water use efficiency under rainfed Mediterranean environments.

Description of the consortium

Geographically, the consortium covers Mediterranean (Spain and Italy) and Non-Mediterranean Europe (United Kingdom and the Netherlands); North Africa (Morocco and Algeria) and the Near East (Jordan, Syria and Turkey). The Consortium is very synergistic both in the nature of the participants institutions, disciplines and environmental conditions. There are a total of 12 organisations involved (two as subcontractors). Four of which are public universities, six public research centres and two international organisations, one of them specifically focusing on Mediterranean agriculture and the other, although belonging to a global organisation, with an explicit mandate towards the agriculture in the drought-prone areas.

ii) Consultative Workshop on Participatory Plant Breeding (CONPAB). (2003 - 2005)

http://www.iamz.ciheam.org/CONPAB

Proposal abstract

Participatory Plant Breeding (PPB) is increasingly considered as an efficient and effective methodology to develop improved crop germplasm specifically adapted to drought as well as to the complex of stresses characterising the marginal environments where rural poverty is widespread.

The Specific Support Action will establish a working group of scientists responsible for plant breeding in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Greece, Italy, France and Spain that will develop plans and strategies on how to develop PPB programmes in drought prone areas in a one-month Consultative Workshop in ICARDA Aleppo, Syria, which is hosting one of the most advanced PPB programmes. In the Workshop, the working group will be exposed to the implementation of PPB on the ground, to its technical aspects, and to the reaction of farmers, scientists, extension organisations, seed companies, and research managers.

The proposed consultative workshop will develop an agreed strategy on PPB, aiming at its adoption as plant breeding strategy for drought prone areas, and ultimately at the alleviation of drought whose frequency is expected to increase in the future. The Workshop might develop a curriculum to introduce PPB in formal University courses, regular degree or non-degree training courses, and eventually a European PPB Working Group. The outputs of the Workshop will be disseminated through the Web, CDs, and booklets.

The consultative workshop will complement the activities of other projects such as MABDE, by exploiting both the knowledge and the germplasm that they generate.

Objectives of the proposed project

The main objectives of the proposed project are (1) to create a group of scientists in a number of Mediterranean countries committed to an innovative way of organising plant breeding programmes that is designed specifically to produce diverse germplasm, more adapted to drought, less dependent on external inputs, and responding to the needs of rural communities, (2) to formulate plans and strategies on how to implement participatoryplant breeding in crops that have strategic importance for the drought prone areas of the region, and (3) to widely disseminate methodologies, plans and strategies. The second and third objectives are both of regional and global relevance as they address the global concern on water scarcity.

Potential impact

The alleviation of the economic consequences of drought has an extraordinary impact. The MABDE project indicated that in the case of barley, a 1% increase in yield in the region represents roughly 15 M €/year, illustrating that net benefits of plant breeding activities addressing this topic are potentially enormous. As this impact will not be confined only to barley, but also to all the more important crops in drought-prone areas, some of which have a higher value, the actual ultimate benefits of a wider adoption of a novel breeding strategy are estimated at not less than 75 M €/year. The project will also have a beneficial impact on biodiversity, since one consistent outcome of PPB programmes are several varieties, each specifically adapted to a given area. This is highly beneficial to the environment because greater crop diversity prevents epidemics of either pests or diseases thus reducing farmers’ dependence on chemical production. It will significantly contribute to key scientific and technological issues of the programme formulating a germplasm improvement strategy for water use efficiency under rainfed Mediterranean environments.

iii) Management Improvements of WUE and NUE of Mediterranean Strategic Crops - Wheat and Barley (WatNitMed). (2005 - 2008)

http://www.iamz.ciheam.org/watnitmed

Project summary

The general objective of this proposal is to identify and transfer improvements in management of wheat and barley through increasing the capture and/or the use efficiency of water and N. The project is based on the premise that understanding the physiological bases of the responses to water x N shortages would allow the design of more consistent management practices to overcome the deficiencies explored, either by directly using the concepts in such strategic design or by being able to build up (or adapt an existing) robust simulation models based on this knowledge and then allowing the testing of different alternatives exploring a large degree of G x E interactions. We aim to improve the understanding of the determinants of the crop ability to capture more water and/or to use water more efficiently in a range of N availability conditions; as well as to capture more N and/or to use N more efficiently in a range of water availability conditions. In this case, both ranges will be characterised and described within the context of the project, (i) identifying plant/crop characteristics that may confer superior ability, (ii) building up a mechanistic simulation model used in the design of management strategies, (iii) testing agronomic hypothetical management strategies in these environments, and (iv) evaluating the socio-economic impact of the adoption of the improved strategies, and actually transferring the outcomes to the producers (with Farmers Associations in our partnership).

Project objective(s)

The main, general objective of this proposal is to identify and transfer improvements in management of wheat and barley (two strategic crops for farmers across the whole Mediterranean region) through increasing the capture and/or the use efficiency of the most limiting factors determining their productivity. This objective may only be fulfilled by tackling both scientific and socio-economic issues, the former related to the proper identification of opportunities for management improvement and the latter related to the necessary analyses of actual improvements for the farmers in the Region and then the required outreach activities to enable the output of the scientific parts to have a realistic chance of making an impact.

Achieving actual management improvements in capture and use efficiency of limited resources is critical not only in its own right but also to power any likely genetic improvement in these attributes that may be achieved. Improvements in crop productivity are clearly the result of the genetic by management interactions (e.g. see various chapters on different crops in Slafer, 1994 and a recent review by Evans and Fischer, 1999). In this context, a project dealing with the bases of management improvement may not only be critical but also timely: The INCO programme in FP5 funded several projects aimed at improving cultivars’ abilities to use limited resources more efficiently (as that of the FP6 would expectedly also fund), and the likely impact of the output of these breeding projects may well depend upon parallel advances achieved in management strategies contributing to improve the same characteristics.

The whole project is based on the premise that understanding the physiological bases of the responses to water x nitrogen shortages would allow the design of more consistent management practices to overcome the deficiencies explored, either by directly using the concepts in such strategic design or by being able to build up a (or adapt an existing) robust simulation model based on this knowledge and then allowing the testing of different alternatives exploring a large degree of G x E interactions.

Water is generally recognised as the most limiting factor for cereal production in regions characterised by Mediterranean weather. However, it has been found that other factors may be as important as (or even more important than) water scarcity in regions characterised by having a Mediterranean weather. For instance, although Australia’s cereal production is allegedly limited by water availability for maximising grain yield, it does actually seem now that poor N nutrition was more responsible than limited water availability for cereal yield losses in actual farming (e.g. Passioura, 2002). Breeding for improving cultivar performance under these circumstances has been continuously carried out in countries of the Mediterranean Basin (and consistently funded by the EU-INCO programme). As crop productivity for a particular region is the consequence of the breeding x management x weather interaction, it has been recognised that it is important to understand the bases for improved management of modern cultivars for the targeted environments to increase the capture or efficiency in use of the most limiting resources. Understanding these bases requires the improved knowledge in levels of organisation immediately below that of agronomy itself (crop and plant physiological studies understanding the bases of plant/crop responses to the range of limiting situations expected to be found in Mediterranean agriculture), complemented by agronomic studies.

Increasing productivity in a sustainable way is a general purpose whenever management strategies are designed in wheat and other crops. Frequently, regional models are produced as a first approach to provide tools for rationally managing crops within the studied area. Recently, there has been an increasing interest in identifying management strategies that were both productive as well as environmentally friendly and sustainable. In this context, it is imperative to provide tools allowing farmers to take more precise decisions than the ones derived from the application of generic regional models. A further step from the regional modelsis to improve the knowledge of the functional bases of yield determination that may be behind the final yield responses to changes in management. Understanding the physiological determinants of crop performance would allow us to determine the causes of the variability expected in the regional models and then to improve the consequent recommendation, by applying such knowledge for the specific conditions of the crop to be managed.

Therefore, in the context of Mediterranean main crops being predominantly limited by water x nitrogen (N) deficiencies, we aim to improve the understanding of the determinants of the crop ability to capture more water and/or to use water more efficiently (WUE) in a range of nitrogen availability conditions; as well as to capture more N and/or to use N more efficiently (NUE) in a range of water availability conditions.

The consortium

The following institutions will participate in the project:

• International Centre for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Zaragoza (Coordinator).
• Lebanese Agricultural Research Insitute
• Ecole Superieure d'Horticulture et d'Elevage de Chott Meriem
• Wageningen University
• Univ. of Nottingham
• Univ. of Barcelona
• MTT Agrifood Research, Finland
• International Centre for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies. Mediterranean Agronomic Institute ofBari
• Universitat Lleida
• University of Jordan, Faculty of Agriculture
• Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique de Tunisie
• Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique
• Union Tunisienne de l'Agriculture et de la Peche'
• Association of Cereal Growers of Foggia