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Moderated conference on Genomics in Food and Agriculture

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Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2013 07:47:48 +0100
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This is Harjit Singh Rekhi, Professor of Crop Genetics and Breeding, University of West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago (on sabbatical leave from a Canadian Federal Agency). 

I support the establishment of Global Genomics/Breeding Forum (Messages 48 - 50, 53).

To make such initiatives useful to the developing countries, in addition to other things, there would be need to provide support for development of mapping populations for the crops important to developing countries. Earlier, in Message 60 of Conference 16 of the FAO Biotechnology Forum on "Learning from the past: Successes and failures with agricultural biotechnologies in developing countries over the last 20 years" (http://www.fao.org/biotech/biotech-forum/conference-16/en/), I said: 

 “…….Tef (Eragrostis tef) is one of the main cereal food crops in Ethiopia, which is largely grown in Ethiopia only. Obviously, other countries may not have priority to initiate work on molecular mapping/tagging in this crop. Fortunately, breeders at the Melkassa Agricultural Research Center, Nazreth, Ethiopia could realize this need and developed recombinant inbred (RIL) populations from intraspecific and interspecific crosses. This led to development of molecular genetic map and quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis of agronomic traits in Tef in collaboration with Cornell University, USA. In the absence of such populations conceived and developed, there would have been no molecular genetic studies in the crop of this developing country........” 

This indicates the importance of providing support to the developing countries in those areas of genomics research where they do not possess capability/resources. This includes developing populations for the crops important to them. However, in crops like cassava, yam, sweet potato (for example) and other such crops which are mandated crops of the CGIAR centres and are important to developing countries, these centres can provide support. 

However, good news is that developing countries like India have developed some populations for basic research useful in genetic enhancement of crops like wheat. Development of a recombinant inbred (RIL) population from a cross of Triticum boeoticum (AbAb - a diploid wild species) and Triticum monococcum (AA - a cultivated diploid wheat species) by us at the Punjab Agricultural University, India  led to development of a molecular linkage map at diploid level in wheat (through Swiss funded international collaboration).

Development of similar populations involving related species of crops of interest to the developing countries would go in a long way to strengthen crop genetic enhancement in the third world. 

Harjit Singh Rekhi 
Professor of Crop Genetics and Breeding
The University of West Indies, St. Augustine
Trinidad and Tobago, 
West Indies
E-Mail: Harjitsingh.Rekhi (at) st.uwi.edu
            harjit1770 (at) yahoo.com
Phone: + 1- 868- 662-2002, Ext. 82078
Fax: + 1 – 868- 645-0479

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