The UN has designated 2020 as the International Year of Plant Health. CGIAR Centers have significant scientific knowledge, extensive experience on the ground, and thought leadership that they can lend to the global discussion to advance awareness, collaboration, and scaling of needed interventions.
CGIARâs International Year of Plant Health events will comprise a series of four webinars of global scope targeting scientists and researchers working in relevant fields. The webinars will take an in-depth look into current science in the area, identify areas for further research, and opportunities to take current scientific innovations to scale.
Each webinar will examine one aspect of the crop supply chain â from genebanks to farmersâ fields to consumersâ plates â to identify ways of promoting the adoption of tools and practices designed to boost the long-term health of plants and the environment in low- and middle-income countries. With the acceleration of the effects of climate change on the incidence and intensity of pests and diseases, identification of the right crop varieties, mix of crops, and tools and practices will be key to ensuring the availability of food to feed the planet.
Webinar 1 will discuss the anticipated impacts of climate change on plant health in smallholder systems, tackling how the occurrence, intensity, and frequency of biotic and abiotic stresses will change as a function of climate change. It will provide participants with information on the negative effects on plant health, in relation to food security, nutrition, environment, gender, and livelihoods, as well as on the role of research in providing support to global efforts to mitigate or adapt to climate change challenges for plant health. Full details of webinar 1.
Webinar 2 will highlight the importance of germplasm (phytosanitary) health in the prevention of transboundary pest and disease spread, as well as the propagation of clean planting material to be used locally. Experts will discuss the implications of poor germplasm practices on agricultural and food system sustainability, farmer livelihoods, and food and nutrition security. They will also examine how opportunities for greater workplace diversity in germplasm health hubs and gender-responsive programming could drive more inclusive sustainable development. Full details of webinar 2.
Webinar 3 examines integrated approaches for sustainable management of transboundary diseases and crop pests and their implications for agri-food system sustainability, social inclusion and gender equity. Drawing on both successes and enduring challenges, experts will identify the potential benefits of more gender-responsive approaches to pest and disease control; more coordinated action by national, regional and global organizations; and lessons to be learned from successful animal health management. Full details of webinar 3.
Webinar 4 brings together scientists working at the intersection of environmental, human, and animal health. In this session, the experts will examine plant health and agriculture from a âOne Healthâ approach â a collaborative, multisectoral, and transdisciplinary perspective that recognizes the health of people, animals, plants, and their environments as all closely connected. In this approach, agricultural practices and plant health outcomes both are determined by, and contribute to, ecological, animal, and human health. Full details of webinar 4.
By adopting best practices and established modern tools, national agricultural research systems (NARS) are making data-driven decisions to boost genetic improvement. And they are measuring this progress through tracking and setting goals around “genetic gain.”
Genetic gain means improving seed varieties so that they have a better combination of genes that contribute to desired traits such as higher yields, drought resistance or improved nutrition. Or, more technically, genetic gain measures, “the expected or realized change in average breeding value of a population over at least one cycle of selection for a particular trait of index of traits,” according to the CGIAR Excellence in Breeding (EiB)’s breeding process assessment manual.
CGIAR breeders and their national partners are committed to increasing this rate of improvement to at least 1.5% per year. So, it has become a vital and universal high-level key performance indicator (KPI) for breeding programs.
“We are moving towards a more data-driven culture where decisions are not taken any more based on gut feeling,” EiB’s Eduardo Covarrubias told nearly 200 NARS breeders in a recent webinar on Enhancing and Measuring Genetic Gain. “Decisions that can affect the sustainability and the development of organization need to be based on facts and data.”
Improved metrics. Better decisions. More and better food. But how are NARS positioned to better measure and boost the metric?
EiB researchers have been working with both CGIAR breeding programs and NARS to broaden the understanding of genetic gain and to supply partners with methods and tools to measure it.
The recent webinar, co-sponsored by EiB and the CIMMYT-led Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat (AGG) project, highlighted tools and services that NARS are accessing, such as genotyping, data analysis and mechanization.
Through program assessments, customized expert advice, training and provision of services and resources, EiB researchers are helping national partners arrive at the best processes for driving and measuring genetic gains in their programs.
For example, the EiB team, through Crops to End Hunger (CtEH), is providing guidelines to breeders to help them maximize the accuracy and precision, while reducing the cost of calculating genetic gains. The guidelines make recommendations such as better design of trials and implementing an appropriate check strategy that permits regular and accurate calculation of genetic gain.
A comprehensive example at the project level is EiB’s High-Impact Rice Breeding in East and West Africa (Hi-Rice), which is supporting the modernization of national rice programs in eight key rice-producing countries in Africa. Hi-Rice delivers training and support to modernize programs through tools such as the use of formalized, validated product profiles to better define market needs, genotyping tools for quality control, and digitizing experiment data to better track and improve breeding results. This is helping partners replace old varieties of rice with new ones that have higher yields and protect against elements that attack rice production, such as drought and disease. Over the coming years, EiB researchers expect to see significant improvements in genetic gain from the eight NARS program partners.
And in the domain of wheat and maize, AGG is working in 13 target countries to help breeders adopt best practices and technologies to boost genetic gain. Here, the EiB team is contributing its expertise in helping programs develop their improvement plans â to map out where, when and how programs will invest in making changes.
NARS and CGIAR breeding programs also have access to tools and expertise on adopting a continuous improvement process â one that leads to cultural change and buy-in from leadership so that programs can identify problems and solve them as they come up. Nearly 150 national breeding partners attended another EiB/AGG webinar highlighting continuous improvement key concepts and case studies.
National programs are starting to see the results of these partnerships. The Kenya Agricultural & Livestock Research Organization (KALRO)âs highland maize breeding program has undertaken significant changes to its pipelines. KALRO carried out its first-ever full program costing, and based on this are modifying their pipeline to expand early stage testing. They are also switching to a double haploid breeding scheme with support from the CGIAR Research Program on Maize (MAIZE), in addition to ring fencing their elite germplasm for future crosses.
KALRO has also adopted EiB-supported data management tools, and are working with the team to calculate past rates of genetic gains for their previous 20 years of breeding. These actions â and the resulting data â will help them decide on which tools and methods to adopt in order to improve the rate of genetic gain for highland maize.
âBy analyzing historical genetic gain over the last 20 years, it would be interesting to determine if we are still making gains or have reached a plateau,â said KALROâs Dickson LIgeyo, who presented a Story of Excellence at EiBâs Virtual Meeting 2020. âThe assessment will help us select the right breeding methods and tools to improve the program.â
Other NARS programs are on a similar path to effectively measure and increase genetic gain. In Ghana, the rice breeding program at Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) have developed product profiles, identified their target market segments, costed out their program, digitized their operations, and have even deployed molecular markers for selection.
With this increased expertise and access to tools and services, national breeding programs are set to make great strides on achieving genetic gain goals.
“NARS in Africa and beyond have been aggressively adopting new ideas and tools,” says EiB’s NARS engagement lead Bish Das. “It will pay a lot of dividends, first through the development of state-of-the-art, and ultimately through improving genetic gains in farmers’ fields. And that’s what it’s all about.”
COVID-19 didnât slow us down! In 2020, our editors continued to cover exciting news and events related to maize and wheat science around the world. Altogether, we published more than 250 stories.
It is impossible to capture all of the places and topics we reported on, but here are some highlights and our favorite stories of the year.
Thank you for being a loyal reader of CIMMYTâs news and features. We are already working on new stories and campaigns for 2021. Sign up for our newsletter and be the first to know!
The 2019 EAT-Lancet Commission report defines specific actions to achieve a âplanetary health dietâ enhancing human nutrition and keeping resource use of food systems within planetary boundaries. With major cereals still supplying about one-third of calories required in the proposed diet, the way they are produced, processed, and consumed must be a central focus of global efforts to transform food systems. This article from our annual report argues three main reasons for this imperative.
Farmers are increasingly adopting conservation agriculture practices. This sustainable farming method is based on three principles: crop diversification, minimal soil movement and permanent soil cover.
A team of scientists has completed one of the largest genetic analyses ever done of any agricultural crop to find desirable traits in wheatâs extensive and unexplored diversity.
A new study analyzing the diversity of almost 80,000 wheat accessions reveals consequences and opportunities of selection footprints. (Photo: Eleusis Llanderal/CIMMYT)
The new AGG project aims to respond to the climate emergency and gender nexus through gender-intentional product profiles for its improved seed varieties and gender-intentional seed delivery pathways.
Farmer Agnes Sendeza harvests maize cobs in Malawi. (Photo: Peter Lowe/CIMMYT)
Maize lethal necrosis (MLN) has taught us that intensive efforts to keep human and plant diseases at bay need to continue beyond the COVID-19 crisis. We interviewed B.M. Prasanna, director of the Global Maize Program at CIMMYT and the CGIAR Research Program on Maize (MAIZE), to discuss the MLN success story, the global COVID-19 crisis, and the similarities in the challenge to tackle plant and human viral diseases.
We had a similar conversation with Hans Braun, Director of the Global Wheat Program and the CGIAR Research Program on Wheat, who taled to us about the need for increased investment in crop disease research as the world risks a food security crisis related to COVID-19.
Maize Lethal Necrosis (MLN) sensitive and resistant hybrid demo plots in Naivashaâs quarantine & screening facility (Photo: KIPENZ/CIMMYT)
Seven ways to make small-scale mechanization work for African farmers.
Local female artisan, Hawassa, Ethiopia. (Photo: CIMMYT)
Cover photo: A member of a women farmers group serves a platter of mung bean dishes in Suklaphanta, Nepal. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)
The Multimedia team at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and our producers around the world kept busy in 2020. They uploaded 50 videos to our YouTube channel and countless more to our social media, intranet and training platforms!
We shot much of this video on location in Svalbard, north of the Arctic Circle, where freezing temperatures put our cameras to the test â but the most challenging part of production was yet to come. After a global pandemic was declared, we had to shoot our first-ever socially distanced interviews, guide people to record themselves and coordinate editing remotely.
Travel with us to the Global Seed Vault, where maize and wheat seeds from CIMMYT’s genebank are are safely backed up.
Half a century ago, scientists collected and preserved samples of maize landraces in Morelos, Mexico. Now, descendants of those farmers were able to get back their ancestral maize seeds and, with them, a piece of their family history.
It is not very often that we are able to use soap opera-style drama to convey science. In this video, actors dramatize the human stakes of the battle against fall armyworm.
At the end of the video, graphics and images show techniques developed by CIMMYT and partners to help real farmers beat this pest.
An online training takes farmers and service providers though a visual journey on the use of conservation agriculture-based sustainable intensification methods.
A series of videos â available in Bengali, Hindi and English â demonstrates the process to become a zero-till farmer or service provider: from learning how to prepare a field for zero tillage to the safe use of herbicides.
In the first installment of this video series for social media, CIMMYTâs maize and wheat quality experts Natalia Palacios and Itria Ibba explain what whole grains are and why they are an important part of healthy diets.
The active involvement of partners in the co-design of project and capacity building activities is key to the success of the Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods (AGG) project, led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT). To that end, the AGG Regional Collaborative Breeding and Testing Networks launched with virtual meetings on September 14 and 15 for southern African partners, and October 28 and November 2 for eastern African partners.
These training events and regional meetings provided opportunities for well over 100 breeders from CIMMYT, national agricultural research systems (NARS) and seed companies to refresh their capacities to improve genetic gains, and to collectively review and discuss upcoming project activities, current issues of interest, and broader project objectives within their current regional context.
Several themes of importance to partners emerged during the network virtual meetings, for attention in future AGG activities and capacity development work.
Gender inclusion and the impact of COVID-19
Ugandan partners, including Godfrey Asea, director of the National Crops Resources Research Institute at Ugandaâs National Agricultural Research Organization, and Josephine Okot, founder and managing director of Victoria Seeds, applauded the projectâs emphasis on inclusion of womenâs knowledge and preferences in breeding programs.
âWe notice that this time there is a lot of focus on gender-inclusiveness,â remarked Asea. âI can tell you there is need for enhanced capacity building for both the private sector and research in proper gender inclusion.â
They also noted the importance of building local capacity, not just for food security but also for other value chain items like raw materials. âCOVID-19 has demonstrated to all policy-makers that we cannot depend on the global supply chains,â said Okot. âHow can we leverage this project if, for instance, some private sector actors want to [know] the appropriate protein-content maize for, say, animal feed?â
Godfrey Asea (R), director of the National Crops Resources Research Institute (NaCRRI) at Ugandaâs National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO), and Daniel Bomet (L), a maize breeder at NARO, admire maize cobs on a farm in Uganda. (Photo: Joshua Masinde/CIMMYT)
Demand for knowledge
NARS members in Tanzania requested increased support on how to measure or assess genetic gains, especially at the national level, to allow them to establish a baseline upon which genetic gains would be pegged for the project lifecycle.
With statistics an essential element to plant breeding â from analyzing yield trials to ranking varieties â the webinar series in Statistical Analysis for Plant Breeders was a first step towards meeting these capacity development needs.
âThe idea of this webinar series was to share insights on how we can improve the breeding plans using statistical methods in an effective way,â said Juan Burgueño, the head of CIMMYTâs Biometrics and Statistics Unit. âThe training offered both theory and hands-on experience using open-access software.â
Reaching farmers
Looking beyond breeding, meeting participants also discussed how to improve access and adoption of improved varieties among farmers.
âFor a large country such as Tanzania, it is at times very hard to reach the farmers,â said Zabron Mbwaga, managing director of the Tanzania-based Beula Seed Company and Consultancy Limited. âWe may have a lot of seed in the store, but how to get the farmers to adopt the newer varieties is quite difficult. This is more so when farmers tend to stick to varieties which they know well and are always reluctant to adopt the new varieties,â he explained.
âWe need to put in a lot of effort to set up demonstration farms and enhance other awareness-raising activities such as radio programs so that farmers can know about the new varieties.â
This interest in working with smallholder farmers along the entire value chain was echoed by partners in southern Africa.
âThrough this project, we would like to explore ways of collaborating along the whole value chain â as the Agriculture Research Council, other partners and small to medium enterprises â to make it an effective chain,â said Kingstone Mashingaidze, senior research manager at the South Africa Agricultural Research Council. âBy planning together, we can identify best-fits for all activities in the value chain and ultimately benefit the smallholder farmers.â
About the AGG Regional Collaborative Breeding and Testing Networks
The AGG Regional Collaborative Breeding and Testing Networks aim to improve breeding efficiencies among partners by enabling the use of modern tools and approaches and enriching the existing network of research organizations, public and private seed companies, farmersâ organizations, non-governmental organizations and community-based organizations. It is expected that these networks will lead to increased efficiency and communications across the partnership network and within countries, improved sharing of best practices and protocols, and increased collective ownership of products for accelerated variety development and turnover.
The virtual meetings for the Regional Collaborative Breeding and Testing Network for southern Africa convened participants from Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe, while meetings for eastern Africa had participants from Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
AGG communications staff Joshua Masinde and Shiela Chikulo contributed to this story.
Alberto Chassaigne has 27 years of experience working in maize seed systems, maize breeding, agronomy and farmer outreach. Since February 2022, he is the Maize Germplasm Bank Curator focusing on the conservation, access to and benefit sharing of the enhanced use of germplasm. As a Maize Seed Systems Specialist, he works focusing primarily on promoting commercial seed production and enhanced adoption of maize hybrids and OPV, developing seed production research, capacity building and scaling production from Breeder Seed to Certified Seed. Since 2013 he has served 73 seed companies and registered 95 CIMMYT varieties in Mexico, and advised the public and private sector in Haiti, Colombia and Peru.Chassaigne holds a PhD in Seed Production from Colegio de Postgraduados, Mexico, a PhD in Agricultural Science and an MSc. in Agronomy from the Central University of Venezuela, and an additional degree in Agricultural Engineer.
The first meetings of the Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods (AGG) wheat and maize science and technical steering committees â WSC and MSC, respectively â took place virtually on 25th and 28th September.
Researchers from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) sit on both committees. In the WSC they are joined by wheat experts from national agricultural research systems (NARS) in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, India, and Nepal; and from Angus Wheat Consultants, the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), HarvestPlus, Kansas State University and the Roslin Institute.
Similarly, the MSC includes maize experts from NARS in Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Zambia; and from Corteva, the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR), the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA), SeedCo, Syngenta, the University of Queensland, and the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
During the meetings, attendees discussed scientific challenges and opportunities for AGG, and developed specific recommendations pertaining to key topics including breeding and testing scheme optimization, effective engagement with partners and capacity development in the time of COVID-19, and seed systems and gender intentionality.
Discussion groups noted, for example, the need to address family structure in yield trials, to strengthen collaboration with national partners, and to develop effective regional on-farm testing strategies. Interestingly, most of the recommendations are applicable and valuable for both crop teams, and this is a clear example of the synergies we expect from combining maize and wheat within the AGG project.
All the recommendations will be further analyzed by the AGG teams during coming months, and project activities will be adjusted or implemented as appropriate. A brief report will be submitted to the respective STSCs prior to the second meetings of these committees, likely in late March 2021.
Usman Kadir and his family de-husk maize on their farm in Ethiopia. (Photo: Apollo Habtamu/ILRI)
The current COVID-19 pandemic â and associated measures to reduce its spread â is projected to increase extreme poverty by 20%, with the largest increase in sub-Saharan Africa, where 80 million more people would join the ranks of the extreme poor. Accelerating the process of delivering high-quality, climate resilient and nutritionally enriched maize seed is now more critical than ever.However, developing these varieties is not a rapid or cheap process. Over the course of five years, researchers on the Stress Tolerant Maize for Africa (STMA) project developed a range of tools and technologies to reduce the overall cost of producing a new high yielding, stress tolerant hybrids for smallholder farmers in the region.
Maize breeding starts with crossing two parents and essentially ends after testing their great-great-great-great grandchildren in as many locations as possible. This allows plant breeders to identify the new varieties which will perform well in the conditions faced by their target beneficiaries â in the case of STMA, smallholder farmers in Africa. In other parts of the world, new tools and technologies are routinely added to breeding programs to help reduce the cost and time it takes to produce new varieties.
Scientists on the STMA project focused on testing and scaling new tools specifically for maize breeding programs in sub-Saharan Africa and began by taking a closer look at the most expensive part of the breeding process: phenotyping or collecting precise information on plant traits.
âWithin a breeding program, phenotyping is the single most costly step,â explains CIMMYT molecular breeder Manje Gowda. âMolecular technologies provide opportunities to reduce this cost.â The research team tested two methods to speed up this step and make it more cost efficient: forward breeding and genomic selection.
Speeding up a long and costly process
Two important traits maize breeders look for in their plant progeny are susceptibility for two key maize diseases: maize streak virus (MSV) and maize lethal necrosis (MLN). In traditional breeding, breeders must extensively test lines in the field for their susceptibility to these diseases, and then remove them before the next round of crossing. This carries a significant cost.
Using a process called forward breeding, scientists can screen for DNA markers known to be associated with susceptibility to these diseases. This allows breeders to identify lines vulnerable to these diseases and remove them before field testing.
Scientists on the STMA project applied this approach in CIMMYT breeding programs in eastern and southern Africa over the past four years, saving an estimated $300,000 in field costs. Under the AGG project, research will now focus on applying forward breeding to identify susceptibility for another fast-spreading maize pest, fall armyworm, as well as extending use of this method in partnersâ breeding programs.
A CIMMYT research associate inspects maize damaged by fall army worm at KALRO Kiboko Research Station in Kenya. (Photo: Peter Lowe/CIMMYT)
Forward breeding is ideal for âsimpleâ traits which are controlled by a few genes. However, other desired traits, such as tolerance to drought and low nitrogen stress, are genetically complex. Many genes control these traits, with each gene only contributing a little towards overall stress tolerance.
In this case, a technology called genomic selection can be of service. Genomic selection estimates the performance, or breeding value, of a line based largely on genetic information. Genomic selection uses more than 5,000 DNA markers, without the need for precise information about what traits these markers control. The method is ideal for complicated traits such as drought and low nitrogen stress tolerance, where hundreds of small effect genes together largely control how a plant grows under these stresses.
CIMMYT scientists used this technology to select and advance lines for drought tolerance. They then tested these lines and compared their performance in the field to lines selected conventionally. They found that the two sets of resulting hybrid varieties â those advanced using genomic selection and those advanced in the field â showed the same grain yield under drought stress. However, genomic selection only required phenotyping half the lines, achieving the same outcome with half the budget.
Innovations in the field
While DNA technology is reducing the need for extensive field phenotyping, research is also underway to reduce the cost of the remaining necessary phenotyping in the field.
Typically, many traits â such as plant height or leaf drying under drought stress â are measured by hand, using the labor of large teams of people. For example, plant and ear height is traditionally measured by a team of two using a meter stick.
Mainasarra Zaman-Allah, a CIMMYT abiotic stress phenotyping specialist based in Zimbabwe, has been developing faster, more accurate ways to measure these traits. He implemented the use of a small laser sensor to measure plant and ear height which only requires one person. This simple yet cost effective tool has reduced the cost of measuring these traits by almost 60%. Similarly, using a UAV-based platform has reduced the cost of measuring a trait known as canopy senescence â leaf drying associated with drought susceptibility âby over 65%.
The identification of plants which are tolerant to key diseases has traditionally involved scoring the severity of disease in each plot visually, but walking through hundreds of plots daily can lead to errors in human judgement. To combat this, CIMMYT biotic stress phenotyping specialist LM Suresh collaborated with Jose Luis Araus and Shawn Kefauver, scientists at the University of Barcelona, Spain, to develop image analysis software that can quantify disease severity, thereby avoiding problems associated with unintentional human bias.
Plant breeders need uniform, or homozygous, lines for selection. With conventional plant breeding this is difficult: no matter how many times you cross a line, a small amount of DNA will remain heterozygous â having two different alleles of a particular gene â and reduce accuracy in line selection.
A technology called doubled haploid allows breeders to develop homozygous lines within two seasons. While this technology has been used in temperate maize breeding programs since the 1990s, it was not available for tropical environments until 10 years ago. In 2013, thanks to joint work with Kenyan partners at the CIMMYT Doubled Haploid facility in Kiboko, this technology was made available to African breeding programs. Now Vijay Chaikam, a CIMMYT doubled haploid specialist based in Kenya, is working towards reducing the cost of this technology as well.
The efforts begun by the STMA research team is now continuing under the Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods (AGG) project. As this work is carried forward, the next crucial step is ensuring that the next generation of African maize breeders have access to these technologies and tools.
âImproving national breeding programs will really drive success in raising maize yields in the stress prone environments faced by many farmers in our target countries,â says Mike Olsen, CIMMYTâs upstream trait pipeline coordinator. Under AGG, in collaboration with the CGIAR Excellence in Breeding Program, these tools will be scaled out.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is proud to partner with the Whole Grain Initiative in celebrating International Whole Grain Day on November 19, 2020.
In terms of diet and nutrition, ours is an age of contradiction. While populations in wealthy countries are faced with unprecedented levels of diet-related disease, close to 2 billion people globally remain food insecure. At the same time, global agriculture has an enormous role to play in the transition towards an environmentally sustainable future.
International Whole Grain Day 2020 is a good day to step back and consider the continued role of whole grains in the healthy, sustainable diets of today and tomorrow. Explore our content to learn what whole grains are, how weâre working to make whole grain wheat and maize even more nutritious, and discover some our favorite recipes.
For a deeper dive into the subject, check out our explainer on whole grains: What they are, why they are important for your health, and how to identify them.
The grain or kernel of maize and wheat is made up of three edible parts: the bran, the germ and the endosperm. (Graphic: Nancy Valtierra/CIMMYT)
CIMMYTâs âA Grain a Dayâ cookbook highlights the big role maize and wheat play in diets around the world, and brings global cuisine to your own kitchen. (Note: not all recipes call for whole grains.) Learn more.
Join members of the Whole Grain Initiative, the FAO and global leaders on November 19 as they discuss the role of whole grains in meeting the âtriple challengeâ of ensuring global food security and improving the livelihoods of agri-food workers in an environmentally sustainable manner. Join the webinar: Building Healthy, Sustainable and Resilient Food Systems.
Interested in learning more about how CIMMYT is working to make grain-based diets healthier and more nutritious? Check out our archive of health and nutrition content.
Featured image: Little girl eating roti, Bangladesh (S. Mojumder/Drik/CIMMYT)
A farmer in Morogoro, Tanzania, discusses differences in his maize ears caused by differences in on-farm conditions. (Photo: Anne Wangalachi/CIMMYT)
Global climate change represents an existential threat to many of the worldâs most vulnerable farmers, introducing new stresses and amplifying the unpredictability and risk inherent in farming. In low- and middle-income countries that are heavily reliant on domestic production, this increased risk and unpredictability threatens disastrous consequences for the food security and wellbeing of rural and urban populations alike.
Given the stakes, substantial investments have been made towards developing climate-resilient crops. But what happens when the innovations widely considered to be beneficial donât gain traction on the ground, among those who stand to lose the most from inaction? What can researchers, policymakers and funders do to ensure that the most vulnerable rural populations donât lose out on the benefits?
These are the questions posed by a new scoping review co-authored by Kevin Pixley, interim deputy director general for research and partnerships and director of the Genetic Resources Program at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).
The paper relies on a descriptive analysis of 202 studies from the past 30 years which assess the determinants of climate-resilient crop adoption by small-scale producers in low- and middle-income countries. These were identified through an extensive search and screening process of multiple academic databases and grey literature sources, and selected from an initial pool of over 6,000 articles.
Taking stock
The authors identified interventions determining adoption across the literature surveyed. A key theme which emerged was the need for context-sensitive technical and financial support for climate-resilient crop adoption. Nearly 16% of the studies found that adoption depended on access to relevant extension programs. Around 12% identified access to credit and other financial instruments as key, while a further 12% identified the implementation of community programs supporting climate-resilient crops as a determining factor.
However, the study stresses that there are no one-size-fits-all solutions. Increased adoption of climate-resilient agricultural innovations will depend on interventions being highly context informed. For example, the review shows that while some studies identified older farmers as more reluctant to adopt new technologies, an equal number of studies found the opposite.
Moreover, the review identified important opportunities for further research. Gender-based approaches, for example, remain a blind spot in the literature. The majority of studies reviewed only included women if they were household heads, thus overlooking the role they may play in influencing the adoption of new agricultural technologies in male-headed households.
A community-based seed producer in Kiboko, Kenya, inspects her crop of drought-tolerant maize. (Photo: Anne Wangalachi/CIMMYT)
Driving evidence-based policymaking
The review was published as part of a collection of 10 research papers produced as part of Ceres2030: Sustainable Solutions to End Hunger. The project, a partnership between Cornell University, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), distills decades of scientific and development research into a clear menu of policy options for funders committed to achieving the UNâs Sustainable Development Goal 2: Ending world hunger by 2030.
Speaking at a German government event on achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2, Bill Gates praised the Ceres2030 initiative, noting that ânothing on this scale has ever been done because we lacked the tools to analyze this complex information. But with the new research, solid evidence will drive better policymaking.â
He went on to highlight the CGIARâs leadership role in these efforts, saying: âThe CGIAR system is a key global institution that is investing in these approaches. Itâs a critical example of how innovation can lead the way.â
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is pleased to announce the release of a new category of maize inbred lines called CIMMYT Maize Genetic Resource Lines (CMGRL). The CMGRLs are derived from crosses between elite CIMMYT lines and landrace accessions, populations or synthetics from the CIMMYT Germplasm Bank.
Although high standards of yield and agronomic performance are applied in their selection, CMGRLs are not intended to be used directly in commercial hybrids but rather by breeders as sources of novel alleles for traits of economic importance. These lines should also be of interest to maize researchers who are not breeders but are studying the underlying genetic mechanisms of abiotic and biotic traits.
A tar spot disease resistant line next to a non-resistant line. (Photo: Terry Molnar/CIMMYT)
Currently the maize genetic resources breeding team has projects in drought tolerance, heat tolerance, tar spot complex (TSC) disease resistance and in the development of lines and hybrids with blue kernel color. For all of these projects, the best lines identified for a given trait objective will be recombined to produce open-pollinated varieties that will be made available to the public.
The inaugural class of CMGRLs includes five subtropical adapted lines for tolerance to drought during flowering and grain-fill and four tropical adapted lines for TSC resistance. Both phenotypic and genotypic data will be published online for all CMGRL releases. CIMMYT will periodically release CMGRLs as superior lines are identified for economically important abiotic and biotic stresses as well as end-use traits.
Release Summary:
CMGRL Name
Trait Target
Type
Level
Landrace Donor Parent
Landrace Country of Origin
Recurrent Parent
Heterotic Group
Adaptation
CMGRLB001
TSC resistance
BC1
S5
OAXA280
Mexico
CML576
B
Tropical
CMGRLB002
TSC resistance
BC1
S5
OAXA280
Mexico
 CML576
B
Tropical
CMGRLB003
TSC resistance
BC1
S5
GUAT153
Guatemala
 CML576
B
Tropical
CMGRLB004
TSC resistance
BC1
S5
GUAT153
Guatemala
 CML576
B
Tropical
CMGRLB005
Drought tolerance
BC1
S5
ARZM12193
Argentina
 CML376
B
Subtropical
CMGRLB006
Drought tolerance
BC1
S5
ARZM12237
Argentina
CML376
B
Subtropical
CMGRLB007
Drought tolerance
BC1
S5
SNLP169
Mexico
CML376
B
Subtropical
CMGRLB008
Drought tolerance
BC1
S5
SNLP17
Mexico
CML376
B
Subtropical
CMGRLB009
Drought tolerance
BC1
S5
SNLP17
Mexico
CML376
B
Subtropical
Full details including phenotypic and genotypic data on the nine lines are available here. To order a 50-kernel seed sample of the CMGRLs, please contact Terry Molnar.
As the calendar turns to October 16, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) celebrates World Food Day. This year’s theme is “Grow, Nourish, Sustain. Together.”
The COVID-19 global health crisis has been a time to reflect on things we truly cherish and our most basic needs. These uncertain times have made many of us rekindle our appreciation for a thing that some take for granted and many go without: food.
Food is the essence of life and the bedrock of our cultures and communities. Preserving access to safe and nutritious food is and will continue to be an essential part of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly for poor and vulnerable communities, who are hit hardest by the pandemic and resulting economic shocks.
In a moment like this, it is more important than ever to recognize the need to support farmers and workers throughout the food system, who make sure that food makes its way from farm to fork.
Sustainable food systems
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), over 2 billion people do not have regular access to safe, nutritious and sufficient food. The global population is expected to reach almost 10 billion by 2050.
Our future food systems need to provide affordable and healthy diets for all, and decent livelihoods for food system workers, while preserving natural resources and biodiversity and tackling challenges such as climate change.
Countries, the private sector and civil society need to make sure that our food systems grow a variety of food to nourish a growing population and sustain the planet, together.Â
This year, for World Food Day, we bring you three stories about CIMMYT’s work to produce nutritious food in a sustainable way.
Cereals offer greater health and nutrition benefits than commonly acknowledged, despite often being considered ânutrient-poorâ, say scientists. Read more.
Breaking Ground: Isaiah Nyagumbo advances climate-smart technologies to improve smallholder farming systems
Systems agronomist transforms farmers’ livelihoods through improved crop performance and soil health, promoting sustainable techniques that mitigate climate change effects. Read more.
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Seed banks may be another resource for securing Indigenous seed, although these banks have other missions as well. The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), maintains seed banks and programs to preserve seeds native to specific regions. The group also leads the CGIAR Research Programs on Maize and Wheat and the Excellence in Breeding Platform to characterize genetic diversity so it can be used in conventional breeding programs to develop wheat and maize varieties that can address climate change, pest and disease resistance and yield to help manage food security.
âAbout 100 seed banks exist worldwide with seed used for cultural or heritage purposes and for production. CIMMYT has varieties that have been cultivated, conserved and cherished as grain and food crops for thousands of years,â says Tom Payne, head of the non-profit organizationâs wheat germplasm collections and International Wheat Improvement Network. âOur seed bank conserves varieties that can be a source for finding old genes that will solve new problems. We have to have that diversity to address changing production environments.â
The process for breeding for grain yield in bread wheat at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) involves three-stage testing at an experimental station in the desert environment of Ciudad ObregĂłn, in Mexicoâs Yaqui Valley. Because the conditions in ObregĂłn are extremely favorable, CIMMYT wheat breeders are able to replicate growing environments all over the world and test the yield potential and climate-resilience of wheat varieties for every major global wheat growing area. These replicated test areas in ObregĂłn are known as selection environments (SEs).
This process has its roots in the innovative work of wheat breeder and Nobel Prize winner Norman Borlaug, more than 50 years ago. Wheat scientists at CIMMYT, led by wheat breeder Philomin Juliana, wanted to see if it remained effective.
The scientists conducted a large quantitative genetics study comparing the grain yield performance of lines in the ObregĂłn SEs with that of lines in target growing sites throughout the world. They based their comparison on data from two major wheat trials: the South Asia Bread Wheat Genomic Prediction Yield Trials in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh initiated by the U.S. Agency for International Development Feed the Future initiative and the global testing environments of the Elite Spring Wheat Yield Trials.
The authors found higher average heritabilities, or trait variations due to genetic differences, for grain yield in the ObregĂłn SEs than in the target sites (44.2 and 92.3% higher for the South Asia and global trials, respectively), indicating greater precision in the SE trials than those in the target sites. They also observed significant genetic correlations between one or more SEs in ObregĂłn and all five South Asian sites, as well as with the majority (65.1%) of the Elite Spring Wheat Yield Trial sites. Lastly, they found a high ratio of selection response by selecting for grain yield in the SEs of ObregĂłn than directly in the target sites.
âThe results of this study make it evident that the rigorous multi-year yield testing in ObregĂłn environments has helped to develop wheat lines that have wide-adaptability across diverse geographical locations and resilience to environmental variations,â said Philomin Juliana, CIMMYT associate scientist and lead author of the article.
âThis is particularly important for smallholder farmers in developing countries growing wheat on less than 2 hectares who cannot afford crop losses due to year-to-year environmental changes.â
In addition to these comparisons, the scientists conducted genomic prediction for grain yield in the target sites, based on the performance of the same lines in the SEs of ObregĂłn. They found high year-to-year variations in grain yield predictabilities, highlighting the importance of multi-environment testing across time and space to stave off the environment-induced uncertainties in wheat yields.
âWhile our results demonstrate the challenges involved in genomic prediction of grain yield in future unknown environments, it also opens up new horizons for further exciting research on designing genomic selection-driven breeding for wheat grain yield,â said Juliana.
This type of quantitative genetics analysis using multi-year and multi-site grain yield data is one of the first steps to assessing the effectiveness of CIMMYTâs current grain yield testing and making recommendations for improvementâa key objective of the new Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods (AGG) project, which aims to accelerate the breeding progress by optimizing current breeding schemes.
This work was made possible by the generous support of the Delivering Genetic Gain in Wheat (DGGW) project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) and managed by Cornell University; the U.S. Agency for International Developmentâs Feed the Future initiative; and several collaborating national partners who generated the grain yield data.
Shivali Sharma (right), pre-breeding research leader at ICRISAT, explains pearl millet pollination techniques to visitors at the ICRISAT campus. (Photo: Michael Major/Crop Trust)
Did you know that vehicles with steering wheels on the left are often cheaper to make than right hand-drive cars? They are mass-produced in much larger batches. But many drivers and governments were just unwilling to change to this dominant design.
We humans are not so adept at change. Instead of embracing novel ways of thinking, weâd rather stick to the old ones. We cling onto what is safe, what is familiar or what we are already good at. We see this in the workplace, in our personal lives and in society as a whole. The world still canât agree on using the metric system!
Within the domain of plant breeding, we are both driving and responding to rapid change. It is mesmerizing to visualize the changes gene editing is about to deliver, not to mention what genomic prediction is already delivering. We are being challenged on every single aspect of plant breeding.
Change of a different sort is about to cascade through the worldâs main network of agricultural research centers â which includes centers at the global forefront of plant breeding. CGIAR is embarking on a transition into a much more integrated One CGIAR organization.
An overarching goal of this integration is no other than to ensure breeding improvement plans â and the changes they aim to drive â are implemented as seamlessly and quickly as possible. The Excellence in Breeding Platform is both driving and supporting this change among CGIAR centers and international and national partners.
The case for change in plant breeding programs
Plant breeders are in fact missing some vital opportunities. For example, there continues to be a rather limited use of real market insights to inform resource allocation within programs. This in turn results in a selection of traits weighted towards what breeders and associated scientists think are needed, which may not necessarily meet actual market needs.
With new goals and structures foisting change on breeding programs, their success depends on one thing above all else: savvy change management. Fortunately, there are some steps we can take to manage change well.
1. Drive out complacency with a sense of urgency
Most change management efforts fail when insufficient urgency is built early enough in the process. But this urgency can be the most effective antidote against complacency. Organizations that have either secured a very dominant and successful position in the market, or lack effective and threatening competition, can very easily slide into a sense of self-righteousness and an inward-looking perspective.
Although CGIAR breeding efforts could be thought of as an example of the latter â lacking competitors â seasoned managers in industry and marketing like to think that âthere is no such thing as a lack of competition.â Funding, for one, is by nature a competition. Funding agencies might look at other fields and/or players to support if they deliver a higher return on investment, not only financially but also socially.
The impact of high complacency cultures can be seen in plant breeding. For instance, a rather large number of breeding programs still lack a high enough rate of what is called âelite x elite crosses.â Unless breeding pipelines run on such crosses, they achieve less than optimal genetic gains and delivery at the field. And donors get a lesser return on investment. Moreover, this complacency means not delivering the best varieties smallholder farmers need to support their families.
The parable of the slowly boiling frog is oftentimes used to portray the consequences of complacency. In any complacency-filled organization, no matter how intelligent, educated and well-intentioned its members are, change is often dead on arrival.
You may already have an inkling of what it takes to create enough urgency: bold and sometimes risk-taking leadership. For instance, some years ago, Unilever was one of the first global companies to decouple its financial growth from its environmental footprint, and it established the then outrageous sounding goal of halving its environmental footprint by 2030.
A good urgency-raising example that could inspire our line of work may be this one: let’s renew at least 50% of a current portfolio of cultivars within the next five years in a given Target Population of Environments (TPE). A second could be: letâs deploy sparse testing in at least 90% of field trials within six months.
To create urgency we need to articulate the gap between opportunities available, and the current ability of the organization to pursue such opportunities. But we must also spell out â upfront â the risks if we donât bridge such a gap.
2. Build a guiding coalition
These days, driving change is too complex to be led by single individuals. We live in fast-paced times. And situations are full of evident and not-so-evident links among myriad moving pieces. We cannot expect one individual to be able to gather enough information fast enough, and then to consistently make the right decisions. Instead, a guiding coalition is needed, with sufficient determination, commitment and thought diversity. Such coalitions require five traits: a position of power, credibility, leadership, expertise, and individual egos held at bay. Once such teams are assembled, the main drivers of success are having a common goal, and enough trust and safety so the real issues are unearthed and addressed.
3. Develop a vision and a strategy
When leadership tries to drive change by applying dated approaches such as micromanagement or an authoritarian stance, plans are likely to fail upon arrival. These methods may breed compliance, but certainly not a fierce and sincere commitment. Because of the extreme uncertainty and organizational survival being at stake, crafting a vision plays a bigger role during change management than during business as usual.
Two main aspects of developing a vision are especially relevant to CGIAR breeding programs.
Firstly, academic and R&D organizations often keep doing what has worked well in the past. But any change management effort ought to be very explicit about what it is known as âstrategic dismissal.â This is the ability to stop and phase out activities no longer providing enough value, or where the outcomes of which are not wanted/needed by funding agencies or beneficiaries. For instance, programs investing in developing hybrid cultivars for the first time in a crop could downsize previous cultivar development efforts. Alternatively, they could scale down efforts in countries that have their own strong local breeding programs. These changes are no small feat, but the inability to phase out activities clashes with the very first posit of any effective strategy: donât just âkeep doing.â
Secondly, a vision provides an invisible fabric that pulls all efforts together in a cohesive way. Therefore, its scope is much wider than most people realize, stretching across strategies, plans, and the budgets and means needed to exert change at the depth and speed needed.
4. Encourage constructive confrontation
One characteristic of a complacent organization stands out: a rather low-candor, low-confrontation culture. No one needs excessively high-confrontation, âtake no prisonersâ, toxic cultures. But low-confrontation cultures tend to breed under-performance, status quo maintenance and deeply ingrained complacency. And perhaps the most negative consequence is that they fail to instill a strong enough sense of ownership and accountability among its members.
Change is coming (it has arrived already…)
Yes, change is hard, but it is coming. Maybe not for drivers of right-hand drive cars. But certainly for those who want to modernize and optimize their breeding programs. Now is the time for us to invest in a smart and forward-looking change management processes.
Hugo Campos is the Chair of the CGIAR Excellence in Breeding (EiB) Platform Steering Committee and Director of Research for the International Potato Center (CIP). This blog was developed with support from EiBâs communications lead Adam Hunt.This is the second in a series of blogs on change in the breeding domain. See the first.
The UN has designated 2020 as the International Year of Plant Health. CGIAR Centers have significant scientific knowledge, extensive experience on the ground, and thought leadership that they can lend to the global discussion to advance awareness, collaboration, and scaling of needed interventions.
Webinar 1 will discuss the anticipated impacts of climate change on plant health in smallholder systems, tackling how the occurrence, intensity, and frequency of biotic and abiotic stresses will change as a function of climate change. It will provide participants with information on the negative effects on plant health, in relation to food security, nutrition, environment, gender, and livelihoods, as well as on the role of research in providing support to global efforts to mitigate or adapt to climate change challenges for plant health. Full details of webinar 1.
Webinar 2 will highlight the importance of germplasm (phytosanitary) health in the prevention of transboundary pest and disease spread, as well as the propagation of clean planting material to be used locally. Experts will discuss the implications of poor germplasm practices on agricultural and food system sustainability, farmer livelihoods, and food and nutrition security. They will also examine how opportunities for greater workplace diversity in germplasm health hubs and gender-responsive programming could drive more inclusive sustainable development. Full details of webinar 2.
Webinar 3 examines integrated approaches for sustainable management of transboundary diseases and crop pests and their implications for agri-food system sustainability, social inclusion and gender equity. Drawing on both successes and enduring challenges, experts will identify the potential benefits of more gender-responsive approaches to pest and disease control; more coordinated action by national, regional and global organizations; and lessons to be learned from successful animal health management. Full details of webinar 3.
Webinar 4 brings together scientists working at the intersection of environmental, human, and animal health. In this session, the experts will examine plant health and agriculture from a âOne Healthâ approach â a collaborative, multisectoral, and transdisciplinary perspective that recognizes the health of people, animals, plants, and their environments as all closely connected. In this approach, agricultural practices and plant health outcomes both are determined by, and contribute to, ecological, animal, and human health. Full details of webinar 4.
