S01 - Session O5 - I - Keynote : Innovations in organic plant breeding with focus of vegetables and fruits

Authors: Monika Messmer *

We urgently need a transformation towards sustainable food systems for a growing world population by delivering locally adapted, affordable and diversified diets. This needs to be achieved with fewer external inputs and environmental impact on the limited agricultural land area while meeting the challenge of climate change. Organic farming and plant breeding are drivers for innovation towards sustainability. Organic plant breeding is an emerging field driven by pioneers and the urgent demand of farmers and gardeners for improved locally adapted cultivars. Organic plant breeding is a holistic, value-based concept focused on breeding for diversity in the living organic soil and for nutritious, delicious food, which also includes cultural and ethical aspects. Technical and social innovations achieved by the European projects DIVERSIFOOD, LIVESEED and BRESOV will be presented focusing on vegetable and fruit crops. A novel concept of systems-based breeding targeting social justice, food and seed sovereignty, and climate robustness calls for better cooperation between community-based, ecosystem-based, trait-based breeding and corporate-based breeding. Phenotypic and genotypic characterization of large numbers of genetic accessions and crop wild relatives is pathing the way to widening the genetic base and utilizing marker-assisted selection to integrate urgently needed traits, such as water use efficiency. Successful approaches of participatory and culinary breeding initiatives involving farmers, cooks, value chain partners and consumers will be presented. Special emphasis is given to breeding under organic conditions considering complex interactions between different organisms in their given environment. This includes breeding for intra-species diversity, such as composite cross populations; inter-species diversity, such as breeding for mixed cropping systems or agroforestry; or breeding at the holobiont level. With the advent of new sequencing tools it is possible for the first time to elucidate the complex interactions of plants with their associated microbiome and explore the potential of microbiome-mediated plant resilience.