We have received this contribution from Theo van Hintum and Liesbeth de Groot of the Centre for Genetic Resources, The Netherlands (CGN). We very much welcome such submissions. Many thanks to Theo and Liesbeth.
CGN strives to promote the use of its plant genebank collections by collaborating with private breeding companies in the search for useful traits. It usually selects material, preferably from its own collection, and organises evaluation trials in consultation with, and funded by, these companies. In this context, CGN recently searched for additional material of a wild leek (Allium ampeloprasum), the most important member of the primary genepool of leek, in order to identify resistance against two fungal diseases, as well as insect tolerance. CGN only has nine accessions of this species, and for the evaluation we aimed at about twenty.
The search in EURISCO for A. ampeloprasum germplasm resulted in a list of 52 accessions from 7 genebanks, and GRIN showed an additional 12 accessions from the USDA network. Most of the accessions of the USDA network came up as unavailable in GRIN; only 2 out of the 12 were available for distribution. In Europe, availability was even worse. The five collections holding more than two accessions were approached. Apart from the nine accessions from CGN itself, the other four collections, holding 40 accessions in total, could effectively provide CGN with only one accession. One collection did not respond to the email request despite repeated attempts, the others informed us that, due to the difficulty in regeneration of this species, no seed was available for distribution, one accession excepted.
The bottom line is that, apart from its own collection, from 52 reported and requested accessions in EURISCO and GRIN, only three were available for distribution. What does this mean for the overall availability of plant genetic resources from national collections. Are we maintaining a database of ‘Dead Souls’?
