Products & Services

1- A series of surveys has been undertaken to define the current needs and constraints of crop breeders and producers. The first survey allowed the definition of GL-TTP activities, products and services adapted to its members’ needs. The report is available for GL-TTP members here.

2- More comprehensive surveys are currently ongoing to feed the information services of GL-TTP, initiate appropriate partnerships between scientists and breeders and define collective projects and training workshops. The questionnaires of the surveys can be downloaded on the membership surveys page, and are outlined below.

Breeding objectives survey
This survey aims to define breeding objectives more precisely, according to real production constraints and market preferences in specific regions targeted by plant breeders. It was initiated in GL-TTP in answer to our members’ request for information on breeders and producers’ needs, and to define rigorously the goal (breeding objectives) before the means (specific projects of technology transfer, characterisation of genetic resources, implementation of marker-assisted selection, etc.)

The rationale of the survey is to identify the local constraints of production and end-use, assess the suitability of breeders’ material for each locally defined context, determine prioritised breeding objectives, and evaluate breeders’ progress and bottlenecks in meeting their specific breeding objectives.

Throughout the survey, breeders are given the opportunity to ask for information on the constraints and requirements of their target zones of production and end-use, for support on the evaluation of their material for specific traits and conditions, and for assistance in identifying more adapted genetic resources.

These data will provide information on agro-ecological zones, markets, and corresponding breeding objectives for different legume species, which may facilitate the identification of regions with similar constraints for prospecting and exchanging genetic resources, for testing the performance of breeders’ material, or for selling adapted varieties. In the future, the identified breeding objectives will be targeted with the most relevant knowledge and tools (such as molecular markers) identified in international research activities.

Genetic resources surveys
Considering the importance of enlarging the genetic base of modern varieties of grain legumes, one of the goals of GL-TTP is to facilitate the access and exploitation of genetic resources for their use in breeding programmes.

The first of two questionnaire surveys aims to assess breeders’ awareness of the level of genetic diversity used effectively in their breeding programmes, to evaluate their current use of wild germplasm and germplasm banks, and to identify bottlenecks in the exploitation of wild germplasm. The second survey concerns the management of information on genetic resources. It will provide information on the format and type of data kept by breeders and used in their databases.

Based on the analysis of the results of these surveys, and in consultation with plant breeders, experts in genetic diversity, managers of germplasm banks and international coordinators of genetic resource management, GL-TTP is defining collective projects or training workshops to evaluate the genetic diversity used effectively in grain legume breeding programmes across the world, propose exchanges of genetic resources between programmes based on their overall genetic distance, facilitate access to germplasm banks and the exploitation of wild germplasm, and suggest improvements to local databases for better interaction with germplasm bank databases and easier breeding workflow.