A global alliance of countries and research institutions, including Cornell, committed to sharing plant genetic material, has secured food access for billions of people, but a patchwork of legal restrictions threatens humanity’s ability to feed a growing global population.
A global alliance of countries and research institutions, including Cornell, committed to sharing plant genetic material, has secured food access for billions of people, but a patchwork of legal restrictions threatens humanity’s ability to feed a growing global population.
That jeopardizes decades of hard-won food security gains, according to Ronnie Coffman, international professor of plant breeding and director of International Programs in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (IP-CALS).
“Global food security depends on the free movement and open sharing of plant genetic resources,” Coffman said July 23 at the International Wheat Congress in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. “Without a strong commitment to scientific exchange in support of global plant breeding efforts, we risk our ability to respond to current food crises and to protect future generations.”
Effective plant breeding programs depend on the exchange of seeds and pathogens, as well as plant genetic material (known as germplasm) between and among countries. Coordination among plant pathologists and breeders forms a symbiotic partnership as plant and disease specimens collected in countries around the world are sent to research institutions to be analyzed and tested. Those findings in turn inform the breeding of improved, location-specific crop varieties that are resistant to disease and adapted to increasingly unpredictable environmental conditions.
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