Proponent
Global Crop Diversity Trust
Date/Timeframe and location
On-going, Global
Main responsible entity
Global Crop Diversity Trust, CGIAR, FAO
Nutrition context
The fight to achieve food security and end hunger is one of the greatest global challenges. Food and nutritional security depends on crop diversity, both at the species and genetic levels. Maintaining the diversity of crops and their related wild species and promoting access to plant genetic resources are requisites to advances in plant breeding.
But all breeding breakthroughs start in the genebank. A greater diversity of genetic resources in genebanks, available to all, is a global safety net that ensures a secure food supply at more stable prices. Such a system provides the raw genetic material to breed for a more nutritious and varied food supply, increasing poor populations’ access to more affordable and healthier food to fight malnutrition.
Key characteristics of the food system(s) considered
Diversity in farming system and food options
Key characteristics of the investment made
The Global Crop Diversity Trust (Crop Trust), in partnership with CGIAR, and under the policy framework provided by International Treaty on PGRFA, is working to ensure the conservation and availability of the crop diversity essential for food and agriculture, forever. Through the Crop Diversity Endowment Fund, the Crop Trust provides financial security to collections of crop diversity by guaranteeing funding at agreed levels, year in and year out. Currently, the Crop Trust has agreements to provide such long-term funding to some of the world’s most important international collections of key crops. It has also extended and supported the global system of crop diversity conservation in other ways, including the construction of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, an ultimate failsafe backup for the world’s seed collections. As the endowment grows, the Crop Trust will be able to secure more crops in more countries through fully funded long-term grants.
Key actors and stakeholders involved (including through south-south/triangular exchanges, if any)
- Global Crop Diversity Trust, CGIAR, FAO (IT PGRFA)
- International, regional, & national genebanks and breeding programs
Key changes (intended and unintended) as a result of the investment/s
Securing the diversity base for the continued development of new and improved varieties that are not only high-yielding and resistant to biotic and abiotic stresses, but also nutrient-dense and climate-smart, contributing to improved crop productivity, more resilient farm households, increased family incomes, and improved nutrition of family members.
Challenges faced
The progress in biofortification and the overall development of new and improved varieties are made possible by the genetic variation preserved in the international genebanks. Yet, the importance of crop diversity stored in genebanks in the development of more nutritious food crops, that are also high-yielding and climate-smart, has often been overlooked.
Lessons/Key messages
Crop diversity contributes to a stable, sustainable, and diverse food production system and plays an important role in improving nutritional outcomes for the consumers.
However, crop collections require constant maintenance, and even brief disruptions or variations in funding can leave material at risk of permanent loss. The conservation of crop diversity in genebanks is by nature a very long-term task. Only stable, predictable support from an endowment fund can guarantee a global system of conservation for a shared resource that is too important for anything less than perpetual care.
Nelissa Jamora