Leader: Merideth Bonierbale

Profile

Principal activities

Enhancing potato germplasm and crop improvement
Enhancing sweetpotato germplasm and crop improvement
Improving root and tuber crops through transgenics
Improving adaptation and variety use

The Germplasm Enhancement and Crop Improvement Division is responsible for CIP's efforts to better understand and to enhance germplasm for improved crop value. This and the Genetic Resources Conservation and Characterization Division represent CIP's foundation, built and solidified over 30 years, and is critical to enhancing our impact and meeting our challenges.

Highlights

The GE&CI Division pursues two avenues of research to shape raw and advanced germplasm into varieties that are robust to the conditions of small-scale farmers, and that meet the growing consumer demand for healthy foods and diversified diets. These include: (1) developing and encouraging the use of improved germplasm through classical/innovative breeding and dissemination programs, and (2) identifying and communicating critical materials, principles, and technologies that will foster basic understanding and encourage applied research by the larger scientific community. Increased emphasis is placed on nutritional and market quality and tolerance to abiotic stress, as well as participatory research and communication.

Reports from Peru, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, and China indicate that CIP's most recently distributed late blight resistant clones are providing well-adapted selections for variety release. Two varieties were released in Uganda this year, and the PRAPACE network (in Partnership Project 12) calculated that 30,300 African farmers have gained more than $US 1.3M from the sale of CIP's improved varieties during the last 5 years. Over 50 elite clones were selected this year from each of CIP's advanced breeding populations—‘B3' for late blight resistance and ‘LTV' for lowland tropics/virus resistance—and these are being prepared for distribution to target countries. Several bacterial wilt resistant clones were confirmed as carrying virus and/or late blight resistance, while providing good crop yields and having excellent chipping qualities.

A single gene model is proposed for the high levels of resistance to PLRV recently accessed from Andigena germplasm. Parallel field and laboratory research has identified novel sources of late blight resistance. Following confirmation of extreme resistance to PVY/PVX in 20 late blight resistant clones from population B3, a concerted effort to combine CIP's two advanced populations to sustain the development of marketable potato varieties with multiple resistances was initiated this year.

Reports from Vietnam, India, China, and Egypt document increasing acreage and new income opportunities from CIP-bred True Potato Seed (TPS) hybrids. In Yunnan, China, the TPS area has increased rapidly to 562 ha since the introduction of CIP's hybrid families four years ago, and an established CIP variety was selected by a local processing factory for its high quality chips. In northeastern India, entrepreneurial women working in groups are opening bank accounts using income from the sale of high quality true potato seed.

The potatoGENE website was improved this year for content and interactivity. The new design includes fora that permit effective scientific discussion about the benefits and risks of transgenic potato. In further efforts to orient molecular breeding to end-user concerns, an ex-ante study of the costs and benefits of transgenic potato was conducted in Peru, and a proposal was developed with Uganda to produce a weevil-resistant sweetpotato using Bt genes and CIP's non antibiotic marker technology.

Popular orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) varieties are being adopted in western Kenya, eastern Tanzania and Uganda. Up to 16 million cuttings were distributed to farmers in this region during 2003. Rural incomes have increased significantly from sales of OFSP storage roots and sales of planting materials.

The sweetpotato breeding network in SSA was strengthened through the collaborative activities of the Vitamin A for Africa (VITAA, Partnership Project 8). Promising OFSP varieties for further on farm evaluation have been identified in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. In addition, 60 true seed families that combine orange flesh and high dry matter were distributed by CIP to four national programs in 2003. Partnerships were established to assess the variability and heritability of Zn and Fe contents of sweetpotato germplasm in anticipation of expanded options for crop improvement.

See also: Realignment of CIP’s Research and Development Program