Farmers and Plant Breeding Current Approaches and Perspectives Issues in Agricultural Biodiversity Series

This book presents the history of, and current approaches to, farmer-breeder collaboration in plant breeding, situating this work in the context of sustainable food systems, as well as national and international policy and law regimes.

Plant breeding is essential to food production, climate-change adaptation and sustainable development. This book brings together experienced practitioners and researchers involved in collaborative breeding programmes across a diversity of crops and agro-ecologies around the world. Case studies include collaborative sorghum and pearl millet breeding for water-stressed environments in West Africa, participatory rice breeding for intensive rice farming in the Mekong Delta, and evolutionary participatory quinoa breeding for organic agriculture in North America. While outlining the challenges, the volume also highlights the positive impacts, such as yield increases, farmers? empowerment in the innovation and development processes, contributions to maintenance of crop genetic diversity and adaptation to climate change. This collection offers a range of perspectives on enabling conditions for farmer?breeder collaboration in plant breeding in relation to biodiversity agreements such as the Plant Treaty, trade agreements and related intellectual property rights (IPR) regimes, and national seed policies and laws.

Relevant to a wide audience, including practitioners with experience in plant breeding and management of crop genetic resources and those with a broader interest in agriculture and development, as well as students of international cooperation and development, this volume is a timely addition to the literature.

Foreword Part I Introduction 1. New Perspectives on Farmer–Breeder Collaboration in Plant Breeding 2. Origins and Evolution of Participatory Approaches in Plant Breeding Part II Current Approaches to Farmer–Breeder Collaboration 3. Long-term Collaboration between Farmers’ Organizations and Plant Breeding Programmes: Sorghum and Pearl Millet in West Africa 4. Rice PPB in India and Nepal: Client-oriented Plant Breeding Using Few, Carefully Chosen Crosses 5. Twenty Years of Participatory Varietal Selection at AfricaRice: Lessons from Farmer Involvement in Variety Development 6. Native Maize in Mexico: Participatory Breeding and Connections to Culinary Markets 7. Pushing Back Against Bureaucracy: Farmers’ Role in Decentralizing Plant Breeding and Seed Production in Honduras 8. Participatory Varietal Selection in the Andes: Farmer Involvement in Selecting Potatoes with Traits from Wild Relatives 9. A 20-Year Journey: Participatory Breeding of Maize in South-West China 10. Evolutionary Participatory Quinoa Breeding for Organic Agroecosystems in the US Pacific Northwest Part III Overarching Concerns and New Perspectives 11. Participatory Plant Breeding: Human Development and Social Reform 12. Building Collaborative Advantages Through Long-Term Farmer–Breeder Collaboration: Practical Experiences from West Africa 13. Sourcing and Deploying New Crop Varieties in Mountain Production Systems 14. Expanding Community Support in Genetic Diversity Management: The FFS Approach 15. From Participatory to Evolutionary Plant Breeding Part IV Collaborative Approaches: International and National Legal Contexts 16. Participatory Plant Breeding as a Tool for Implementing Farmers’ Rights and Sustainable Use under the Plant Treaty 17. Funding Participatory Plant Breeding: Outlook and Future Challenges 18. Seed Laws: Bottlenecks and Opportunities for Participatory Plant Breeding 19. Participatory Plant Breeding and Sui Generis Plant Variety Protection 20. The Straitjacket of Plant Breeding: Can It Be Eased?

Ola Tveitereid Westengen is an Associate Professor at the Department of International Environment and Development Studies (Noragric), Faculty of Landscape and Society, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway.

Tone Winge is a Senior Research Fellow at the Fridtjof Nansen Institute, Lysaker, Norway.