Preserving and mobilizing agrobiodiversity to meet the major challenges facing agriculture

France's first "bank" for the conservation of cultivated plants, ARCAD brings together almost 50,000 samples (vines, maize, Medicago, sorghum, durum wheat, rice, millet, cotton, fonio, groundnuts, etc.), in seed or cryo-bank form, as well as analysis platforms and skills for studying diversity in its various components: biological, molecular, social, etc.

In view of the acceleration of current global changes (environmental and socio-economic), studying, conserving and valorizing the diversity of cultivated plants and their wild relatives is becoming essential. Some old varieties or wild populations, sometimes threatened with extinction, may be less sensitive to climate change, emerging diseases or pests. They can also be used as parents for new varieties better adapted to these new contexts, or to identify interesting genes or genotypes to be combined in diversified cover crops.

What's more, cultivating a diversity of species and varieties is a guarantee of resilience, especially for family farms, which account for over half of the world's agricultural production. It is a guarantee of food and nutritional security. Lastly, conserving, studying and disseminating this diversity, by articulating the different modes of conservation in a complementary way - in the fields with farmers to centers like ARCAD - and by recognizing the different processes and players involved in creating diversity - farmers, researchers, breeders - are important orientations for ensuring food and agro-ecological transitions on a global scale.

Contact:

• Roland Cottin, RARe Operational Manager
• Joelle Ronfort, UMR AGAP