Description de l’initiative/projet

Domaines couverts par l’initiative/projet :

• Plant genetic resources (PGR)

Nombre de partenaires: 23
Portée du projet: Internationale
Motivation initiale pour le démarrage de l’initiative/projet: Based on the hypothesis of “diversity”, SOLIBAM has designed and tested innovative strategies to develop specific and novel breeding approaches integrated with management practices to improve the performance, quality, sustainability and stability of crops adapted to organic and low-input systems. The SOLIBAM project has been carried out by 23 partners, representing 12 countries in Europe and Africa, within the context of a lack of adapted varieties specifically for organic and low input agriculture. A fundamental characteristic of these farming approaches is a wide range of variability within the farming system, combined with a wide range of environmental variation. Having a choice of adapted plants and practices is the only means to build a sustainable farming system which is characterized by a complexity of interactions. As a basis the team – representing several kinds of actors, researchers, seed companies, farmer’s organisations and also involving end-users and consumers – therefore developed tools and methodologies to better understand and manage complexity. From more than 50 field experiments and case studies in 4 countries and 8 major crop models (durum and soft wheat, barley, maize, faba beans, bean, tomato and broccoli), combined with several competencies including genetics, plant breeding, agronomy, ecology, food science, statistics, sociology and economics, SOLIBAM has established 10 major concepts for cultivating diversity (resilience, robustness, functional biodiversity, yield stability, adaptability, intercropping, sustainability, evolutionary processes, organoleptic quality, participatory research), building strong transdisciplinarity in a dynamic process of knowledge integration. Within SOLIBAM, plant diversity was observed, analysed, developed and enhanced by the creation of new populations and varieties exploited for novel crop management practices. Genetic structure, observed by relevant markers, of the different types of varieties and populations studied strongly reflected the selection / conservation history of the populations showing, in many cases, significant and rapid differentiation due to cultivation in contrasting agro-climatic conditions and to farmers’ breeding practices or breeding.

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