Profile 3 Breeding

Rationale:
Major advances have been made in crop improvement strategies in developed countries which are making possible the huge crop surpluses being achieved by those countries. Scientific breakthroughs have led to the development of many variety development methodologies several of which include biotechnology applications. Although the majority of African countries have over the years since independence established research and variety improvement programmes to support their agriculture, in the majority of cases the expertise employed lags behind international levels or are inappropriate. Strategies employed are not adequate to keep pace with current demands, adoption rates by consumers of new technological introductions are far too low, and capacity building has not kept pace with the demands of modern agriculture.

Lack of cooperation between national programmes, inappropriate variety development strategies, inadequate resource allocation to research and unsuited policies with regard to the research mandate and players continue to hinder progress in variety development.

Objective:

The objective of the project is to assist national research and seed programmes to develop better seed and varietal improvement programmes and technologies through the adoption of appropriate strategies for variety improvement including through biotechnology applications.

Activities:

The activities of the project will be conducted at continental, regional and national levels over a five year period and will include the following activities:

• Coordinate development of variety improvement strategies at the regional and national levels in collaboration with NARS, the CGIAR centres, private sector and other partners.

• Promote technology transfer, including proprietary technologies in partnership with technology holders and advanced research institutes.

• Promote the development and maintenance of information dissemination systems to facilitate technology transfer.

• Coordinate and support the development of training programme materials on modern technologies, including biotechnologies for variety development.

• Support the establishment and maintenance of crop-based networks to perform germplasm exchange and multi-locational evaluation.

• Coordinate capacity building for agro-ecological characterization and interpretation.

• Conduct training courses on phytosanitary guidelines and seed and planting materials handling and quality maintenance practices for safe movement of germplasm.

• Conduct training courses on best practices in regional initiatives for germplasm conservation, varietal improvement and exchange.
• Provide degree training (MS, Ph.D) in varietal improvement, seed technology and biotechnology application to seeds

Expected Results and Outputs:

The main output of the project will be a set of programmes and technologies relating to variety improvement developed and adopted by national research and seed programmes by which the national variety improvement effort will be undertaken. The project will specifically produce reports, manuals and publications, training materials, demonstration plots and research facilities such as greenhouses and laboratories. It will produce a large number of research staff, particularly at the technician level, and create a high level of awareness among policy makers, donors and partners to enhance support and collaboration for the variety development effort.