GLOBAL CONSERVATION OF STRAWBERRIES: A STRATEGY IS FORMED

Abstract

Strawberry was listed in the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources, Annex 1, as a crop of global horticultural significance. The Global Crop Diversity Trust and Bioversity International requested that a global conservation strategy be developed for strawberry. A coordinator was appointed and an international expert committee meeting was held July 5 to 8, 2006, at the US Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, National Clonal Germplasm Repository, Corvallis, Oregon. A questionnaire about strawberry holdings was sent to 537 international strawberry contacts. Responses were received from 37 locations in 27 countries. More than 12,000 accessions of species and cultivated strawberries are maintained at respondent locations. Roughly half of the accessions represent advanced breeding lines of the cultivated hybrid strawberry, F. ×ananassa. Six major genebanks (US, Canada, Russian Federation, Chile, Germany, and Spain) of the 20 genebanks respondents had collections of 500 accessions or more. Private corporations maintain >15,000 proprietary strawberries for internal use that are unavailable for distribution. Primary collections at national genebanks consist of living plants protected in containers in greenhouses, screenhouses, tube structures, or planted in fields. Secondary backup collections are maintained in vitro under refrigeration. Long-term backup collections of meristems are placed in cryogenic storage at remote locations to provide decades of security. Species diversity is represented by seedlots stored in -18°C or backed-up in cryogenics. The committee recommended that the capacity building of two genebanks be supported in Asia and South America. Limited resources are constraining genebanks from sufficient personnel, pathogen-free plants, secure backup, adequate facilities, and equipment. The committee also recommended that a granting system to improve facilities for and health of accessible genebank strawberries, funding for training of genebank staff in standard protocols, and coordination of characterization data using a common ontology and a web-accessible inventory should also be supported.