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ICARDA
and CIMMYT Harnessing the Power of Partnership in Wheat Improvement |
Combating Disease Epidemics After the dissolution of the USSR, self-sufficiency in food production became a major national objective in several Central Asian republics. Wheat--a commodity formerly supplied by the USSR--became as important as cotton, the major cash crop. Wheat is grown in winter and spring, followed by cotton in summer. It covers a wide swathe, from Iran to Mongolia, which means that Central Asia's cotton and fallow fields no longer form a natural barrier to rust spores carried by wind from other regions. Most commercial wheat varieties in Central Asia were developed locally or originated in Russia. However, they are highly susceptible to yellow rust. In the last decade, Central Asian farmers have suffered wheat losses as high as 50% in two major yellow rust epidemics. The risk of yellow rust epidemics is finally diminishing with the introduction of resistant varieties from IWWIP, which Central Asian breeding programs have been using to fortify their own varieties since the mid-1990s. Four resistant IWWIP varieties are registered in Georgia, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, and 29 are currently in registration trials in Central Asia and the Caucasus countries. This is just one example of the impact of collaboration across the region. |