Basic studies toward strategies for conservation of plant genetic resources
1999
Hammer, K. (University of Kassel, Kassel (Germany)) | Diederichsen, A. | Spahillari, M.
The total number of plant species, which are cultivated as agricultural or horticultural crops, can be estimated to be close to 7,000 botanical species. Nevertheless, it is often stated that only 30 species "feed the world" because the major crops are made up by a very limited number of species. The latter is also the major reason that 6 milion of accessions collected and conserved in genebanks belong to a very limited number of species compared to the total number od species, which contribute to food security. About half of all accessions maintained in ex situ cellections are advanced cultivars or breeders'lines, while just over one third of them are made up by landraces, or old cultivars, and about 15 % are wild relatives of crop species, weedy plants or wild plants. Only a third of all accessions are characterized. There is obviously a gap in the collections regarding minor crops and underutilized speices, in particular landraces and wild relatives of crops from the respective crops'centres of diversity and cultivation are underrepresented in genebanks.
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