The Citrus Sanitation Center of Estación Experimental Agroindustrial Obispo Colombres, Six Years after Its Establishment

Abstract

The Citrus Sanitation Center was established in October 2004, in Tucuman province, Argentina with the main objective of establishing a virus-free and true-to-type source of budwoods of all the main citrus varieties and rootstocks in North Western Argentina. Its aim was also to ensure that citrus growers would be supplied with the best genetic citrus material, free from any harmful pathogens. At present, 25 citrus varieties and rootstocks have been recovered through the standard procedure of shoot-tip grafting in vitro, coupled with an intensive indexing program to make sure that they are free of graft-transmissible pathogens. Also, other 16 varieties and rootstocks will shortly be part of the foundation block. A field observation block for horticultural evaluation was established in 2006 as a duplicate of the virus free foundation block trees. In 2009, the first 72,600 certified budwood materials of the main lemon varieties were released. This paper is a brief report of the background and present status of the Citrus Sanitation Center, its current activities, technical advances, and plans for the future.