Plant genetic resource conservation, documentation and utilisation in central Asia and the Caucasus

• Centre for Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture, Australia
• Australian Winter Cereals Collection, Australia
• Research Institute of Genetic Resources, Azerbaijan
• Georgian Research Institute for Crop Husbandry, Georgia
• Armenian Botanic Institute, Armenia
• Ministry of Agriculture, Kazakhstan
• Research Institute of Crop Husbandry and Plant Industry, Kyrgyzstan
• Tajik Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Tajikistan
• Turkmen Research Institute of Cereals and Legumes, Turkmenistan
• Uzbek Research Institute of Plant Industry, Uzbekistan
• Department of Primary Industries, Victoria, Australia

The range of environmental stresses in which cropping production is undertaken in Central Asia and the Caucasus' (CAC) mirror many of those in Australia: salinity, desertification, acidity, encroaching urbanisation and climatic changes. These create pressures on cropping varieties, through biotic (plant) and abiotic (soil) stresses and constraints, often causing rapid changes in the interactions between plants and their environment.

There is potential that many of the factors threatening production in changing environments may be manageable through tapping into the rich storehouse of agro-biodiversity found in cropping varieties in CAC. The region is both a centre of origin for many crop species and their near relatives, as well as varieties adapted to a range of climates, stresses and environmental constraints. Maintaining the Plant Genetic Resources (PGR) of the CAC region is vital to realising its potential.

Since the break-up of the former Soviet Union research capacity in the CAC has been significantly disadvantaged. An effective research and development sector is vital to boosting agricultural productivity and to ensuring the conservation of genetic resources that may have a valuable role to play in achieving greater productivity. The establishment of sustainable national programs covering collection through to preservation has been achieved through a previous ACIAR-ICARDA project. Building on the momentum of this work is needed to ensure capacity in PGR conservation and other plant-related research is entrenched.

Objective 1: Consolidate the development of a long-term regional capacity to collect, conserve, document, utilise and exchange PGR in accordance with their obligations as signatories to the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

Objective 2: Identify and assemble national base collections of seed for field crop species.

Objective 3: Consolidate the development of a comprehensive national and regional PGR information system that will allow 1) PGR workers to collect, acquire, conserve and document national PGR collections more efficiently and 2) plant breeders to more efficiently utilise PGR from the region.

Objective 4: Compile detailed information surfaces that characterises the environments from which PGR have been collected in the CAC region.

Objective 5: Collect and characterise material from under-represented agro-climatic-edaphic regions in CAC.

Objective 6: Identify and screen subsets of accessions originating from the CAC region that have potential variation for limiting factors of importance to the CAC and Australian scientific communities.

Objective 7: Disseminate information generated to likely end-users of PGR particularly in the CAC region and to the Australian scientific community.

Capacity development of national programs:
Provision of technical support and training for established national PGR units.
Development of regional PGR network by linking national PGR units.
Annual PGR coordination meetings.
Technical and training support for the development of seed storage facilities.
Data-capture and analysis:
Expansion of national inventory databases to include collection site, characterization and evaluation data associated with each accession.
Development of a regional database and a mechanism to update it through networking national PGR units.
Capture of information on global ex-situ holdings of CAC accessions into regional database.
Use of GIS surfaces detailing the CAC environment to derive detailed data about collection sites.
Screening of accessions for potential tolerance to a variety of important limiting factors (particularly diseases) and identification of trait-specific sub-sets using eco-geographic data and statistical procedures.
Strategic collection missions:
Analysis of detailed information on all previous CAC collection missions using GIS tools.
Plant collection missions will focus on regions with high diversity and low representation in ex-situ collections.