Managing genebanks: seed base collection examined

• Published in: Genetic resources and crop evolution Vol. 48; no. 4; pp. 321 - 328
• Main Author: Allem, Antonio C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Nature B.V 01-08-2001
• Subjects: Agricultural management; Collection; Collections; Crops; Cultivars; Environmental degradation; Food; Food production; Food security; Gene banks; Germplasm; Market economies; Materials selection; Plant breeding; Repositories; Stochasticity; Supermarkets; Wild type
• ISSN: 0925-9864; 1573-5109
• DOI: 10.1023/A:1012001727339

An idea is advanced for the composition of seed base collections. Policy planning needs to be rethought as to the inventory of base collections. Curators often concentrate on the storage of unadapted cultivated materials while neglecting select improved cultivars and crop wild relatives. The fact that germ plasm customized to the farmer's immediate needs is present in low numbers in cold chambers suggests that base collection management operates at a relative distance from a market economy intent on food production. This attitude is antithetic to food security and raises the need for expert questioning on proper gene bank management. The view put forwarded here is that three major areas should head the inventory of base collections in genebanks, viz. landraces, improved breeding materials of multiple categories, and crop wild relatives. Base collections must ultimately serve society by becoming repositories for regulating and replenishing agricultural stocks, should stochastic catastrophe strike in the farm. The relentless pace of environmental degradation means that conservation per se is the top priority for crop wild relatives.