Genetic Resources and Their Exploitation - Chickpeas, Faba beans and Lentils

Abstract

The introduction of high-yielding, new cultivars is rapidly transforming traditional and peasant fan lands into fields of uniform crops. The modern cultivars provide significantly higher yields; they are better adapted and have better disease resistance and help significantly to solve world problems of hunger and malnutrition. Unfortunately, these new varieties, with their narrow genetic base, replace the traditional cultivars (the very genetic diversity which was used for the creation of such new varieties) may be quickly responsible for the total elimination of indigenous ancestors (landraces or primitive cultivars) developed over millennia of cultivation. Crucial as it is to enhance agricultural productivity to alleviate hunger and malnutrition, it is equally important to conserve and make available plant germplasm to meet the increasing demands of plant scientists. Development must not lose sight of the need to conserve genetic resources. Concern over the loss of valuable sources of plant germplasm has been widely recognized in the past two decades. Many institutions around the world hold collections of crop germplasm and their wild relatives, which were assembled over the last fifty years or so by exploration and seed exchange. They contain thousands of samples and were made, for the most part, either to help plant breeding and agricultural development or for studies on the diversity and evolution of crops. The International Board for Plant Genetic Resources was established in 1974 by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (the parent body of the International Agricultural Research Centers (IARC's) such as ICARDA, IITA, and IRRI) to coordinate existing national, regional, and international plant genetic resources conservation efforts. The FA0 provides the Executive Secretariat and Headquarters for the IBPGR. Financial support for the IBPGR is provided by various governments and agencies. The IBPGR is developing international collaboration among the voluntary numbers of a global network of genetic resources centers, whose activities will serve to safeguard and make freely available, for crop improvement purposes, the genetic variability of major food crops and other plants of economic importance. The IBPGR is promoting a greater awareness throughout the world of the urgency and need for genetic resources activities. Since the IBPGR was established eight years ago, a great deal of progress has been made towards the organization of a global network of crop genetic resources centers. At the same time, a large number of exploration and collecting missions have been carried out in a wide range of eco-geographical areas throughout the world.