200068 FAO improvement Landraces Wheat Barley North Africa Fourth_Fourth Technical report Results

Abstract

Bread wheat, durum wheat and barley are the major staple food crops of Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria. In these countries, both wheat and barley are used for making bread and other products for human consumption. Barley is also used as animal feed. The yield levels of these crops are low to medium, because of occurrence of pests and diseases, drought, salinity and high temperatures resulting in lower production. Climate change (CC) further aggravated these problems. As a result, the three countries are not self- sufficient in production of wheat and barley and import for the domestic consumption. Plant genetic resources are the raw materials used to create new crop varieties with biotic and abiotic stresses resistance, play a strategic role in adaptation to changing climate and food security.

Developments in genomics have provided new tools for estimating diversity, discovering and tagging novel alleles and genes for resilience in PGRFA. These tools can enhance the efficiency of breeding programs through their use in marker-assisted selection (MAS). Integration of in vitro culture techniques such as doubled haploids (DHs) and genomics tools can enhance genetic gains by reducing generation time and increasing selection efficiency, respectively, thereby speed up development of climate-smart cultivars.