Climate-smart seed systems How to inject more geography in crop improvement

Jacob van Etten

Seed system

Germplasm selection

Germplasm often collected 10-50 years ago

Climates are changing

Geographical tools to aid germplasm selection

GIS tools for germplasm selection

Breeding

Determination of target environments, selection of locations to do selection

Determining environmental adaptation traits for (future) environment

Seed production

Variety recommendations often outdated or with weak empirical (geographical) basis

Few examples of dynamic updating of recommendations based on weather forecasts

Information asymmetry

Annicchiarico et al.

Recommendation domains

Getting more territorial: local seed banks and reserves

Ex situ conservation,

directly accessible to smallholders

Seed reserves to respond to

emergencies

Local human capital

Local diversity

responds to diverse needs

Participatory methods

Ongoing work

More “territorial” participatory methods have been used more intensively for over two decades now.

How can we mainstream and massify these methods?

Can we make use of ICTs (mobile telephones, sensors) to make this possible?

What about a citizen science approach?

Crowdsourcing crop improvement in India

Evaluation card Unique code: 8181

Germination:_______ Yield:___________ Etc. _____________ ________________ ________________ ________________

1

2

3

8181

1

2

3

Registration card Unique code: 8181

Name:____________ GPS:_____________ ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________

+ -

A > C > D

A > D > G

A>C>D>G

Software prototype

Data analysis

Conclusions

Preliminary data show that crowdsourcing crop improvement is viable

Many opportunities to build more capacity using territorial/participatory approaches to improve crop seeds