A commitment to biotechnology

The International Potato Center (CIP) recognizes that the most effective and efficient approaches to the problems of crop production in the developing world are integrated ones. CIP’s research strategy is to use combinations of disciplines that do not rely on a single track to find solutions. This is especially true for CIP’s approach to biotechnology.

Biotechnology could contribute in many ways to develop technology that would help national institutions to pursue food security, poverty reduction, and environmental protection centered on small-holder farmers in developing countries. Applications of biotechnology have the potential to solve problems that would otherwise be difficult, if not impossible, using standard plant breeding techniques.

Biotechnological avenues include the selective use of the treasury of biological diversity of CIP’s mandate crops and their wild relatives, to develop precise genetic maps and markers and to integrate these into breeding practices. By doing this, CIP scientists can incorporate natural resistance and improve crops in a fraction of the time once required to accomplish similar work.

CIP scientists recognize that potato and sweetpotato are near-perfect candidates for molecular breeding, primarily because of their genomic complexity and their amenability to genetic transformation. Unlike other major crops which are inbred, genetic transformation for potato and sweetpotato is literally the only way in which genes for a single new trait can be added to improve a variety without otherwise modifying its genetic composition.

Currently, about 15 % of the Center’s internationally recruited scientists work in biotechnology, a clear recognition of the potential it holds for scientific advancement. CIP also relies on cooperative agreements with advanced laboratories to carry out much of its "upstream" research agenda. In addition to producing considerable savings, this approach creates an intellectual bridge between state-of-the-art research institutions, which are most often located in the industrialized world, and CIP’s principal partners: national research institutions in the tropics. These agreements have the added benefit of keeping the advanced laboratories aware of the ongoing problems facing food producers in the developing world.

As modern molecular research continues to evolve, CIP recognizes the need to periodically report on the outcome of its work. It is in that spirit that this report on biotechnology and its applications is presented.