Gender and social inclusion guiding more impactful breeding productsThe Gender and Breeding Initiative (GBI) has piloted a set of G+ tools for gender-responsive breeding. The tools have been successfully piloted in several breeding programs and have attracted attention from breeders and social scientists in many CGIAR centers. The tools help multidisciplinary teams to share knowledge and collaborate as they address … Read More

Sweetpotato’s wild relatives may help the crop adapt to climate changeAt least some plants have genes for a certain kind of “memory.” A young plant exposed to a stress (like drought) may be better prepared for similar trouble later in life. Researchers in Peru withheld irrigation water to induce a memory of drought in 59 accessions of the sweetpotato’s closest … Read More

Genomics sheds light on origins of Guinea yamUnderstanding the genetic diversity of yam is crucial for improving this important crop. When researchers at IITA and partners analyzed the genome of the Guinea yam (Dioscorea rotundata) by sequencing 336 accessions of yam, including its wild relatives (D. abyssinica and D. praehensilis), they found that the domesticated Guinea yam is probably a … Read More

Genomics and bioinformatics to breed for high-yielding, biofortified sweetpotatoGenomic tools and strategies developed for polyploid genomes such as those of sweetpotato, potato, banana and yam, are helping to tackle complex bottlenecks in sweetpotato breeding. This includes storage root bulking (for higher yields) and breaking the negative correlation between starch and beta-carotene (provitamin A) content for orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP). Low starch … Read More

Choose the best and the worst out of three: Tricot simplifies variety testing with large numbers of farmersThe triadic comparison of technology options (tricot) crowdsources data from individual farmers, consumers or others to evaluate and rank three technology options. RTB is using this novel approach to test varieties in many farmers’ fields at once and has piloted tricot with cassava … Read More