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We've moved

As part of Bioversity International's grand new web site, press releases and other materials are now available here.

We are leaving this site up and active in case people have bookmarks that they want to keep, but if you use an RSS feed Reader to subscribe to Bioversity News, you will need to go to the new site and re-subscribe to a new feed. Permalink

Biodiversity (and Bioversity) impress Kenyan government

Showing vegetables to President Kibaki of Kenya is Maryam Imbumi, a botanist at National Museums of Kenya, who has been working with Bioversity International on a variety of projects related to the use of traditional African leafy vegetables to enhance dietary diversity and thereby improve nutrition.

The occasion was the official opening of the 25th FAO Africa Regional Conference. Bioversity mounted a stall displaying the diversity of traditional leafy vegetables, which attracted considerable attention from President Kibaki and his entourage. The President asked for a copy of a Bioversity publication on traditional leafy vegetables, and engaged in a lively discussion about the importance of making use of the full range of agricultural biodiversity to address issues of food security in Kenya. Bioversity's Regional Director Joseph Baidu-Forson emphasized the need for further research into neglected and underutilized species, and Honourable William Ruto, Kenya's Minister of Agriculture, was in full agreement.

The Daily Nation's report on the event, and a copy of President Kibaki's speech, can be viewed online. Permalink

Training course on in vitro and cryopreservation techniques

Bioversity International and the National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources in India are once again organizing an international training course to teach techniques for conserving genetic diversity. The course will focus on in vitro conservation and cryopreservation, vital approaches to the conservation of some crops, such as fruit trees and many root and tubers, that cannot be conserved as seeds. It is designed to enhance the skills of young scientists who are already working in genebank conservation.

"We are very pleased to be able to offer the course again, thanks to the sustained and strong support from NBPGR and India," said Elizabeth Goldberg, Head of Capacity Development at Bioversity International.

"Last year we had ten participants from seven countries," said Prem Mathur, Bioversity's local organiser in New Delhi, "and they found it very worthwhile."

The participants' feedback bears this out.

Dr Maizura Ithnin, from the Malaysian Palm Oil Board, praised the interactions with the experts. "Hands-on experience, the tips, do's and don'ts, were valuable," she said, adding that she would recommend the course unhesitatingly to anyone seeking to establish cryopreservation facilities.

Participants valued the formal teaching. "It had a very high technical and scientific standard, it far exceeded my expectations," said Sandra Constantino, of the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, Colombia. "Lectures and practicals were very good, very well planned and delivered." And because the course required students to have some prior experience "no time was lost on very basic things that all the students already knew".

Justin Ugochukwu Ogbu, a Research Officer at the Root Crop Research Institute in Nigeria said that the course "armed me with enhanced skill and knowledge which I have applied in solving related problems in my home institution, as well as in my on-going PhD research programme".


Participants in the 2007 workshop (left to right) Sandra Constantino from Colombia, Shiranee D. A. from Sri Lanka, V. Ramsundar from India, Ruchira Pandey from NBPGR, Maizura Ithnin from Malaysia, Neelam Sharma from NBPGR.

Perhaps the only quibble was with the food; many participants found it too highly spiced.

"We'll be taking care of that this time," joked Prem Mathur. "I do urge anyone with an interest to apply for the course," he added.

For further information, contact Elizabeth Goldberg.
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Cautious Welcome For Food Summit Declaration

For immediate release
Rome, Italy
Bioversity International, one of the 15 international agricultural research centres supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), today broadly welcomed the declaration adopted yesterday by the High-Level Conference on World Food Security in Rome.

"While there was a lot that governments could not agree on, such as trade agreements and biofuels, two things were mentioned in almost every statement; the need for humanitarian aid and the need to invest more in agricultural research and development," said Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity International, who represented the CGIAR at the High-Level Conference.

Thanks to pledges of additional support, The World Food Programme and others will be able to help those in greatest need.

"That's excellent, but we also need to see money to match the rhetoric of more research and development. Otherwise, when the food crisis reoccurs, as it will, it will be even worse than this time," Frison warned.

The Declaration "urge[s] the international community, including the private sector, to decisively step up investment in science and technology for food and agriculture".

Among the many delegates calling for greater support for research and development was Ed Schafer, US Secretary of Agriculture.

"We must invest in scientists and research institutions," he told the conference on the opening day. He also said that he had discussed how to increase agricultural productivity in developing countries with Norman Borlaug, the Nobel Laureate whose work with the forerunners of the CGIAR produced the Green Revolution and is estimated to have saved a billion lives.

"That's ironic," Frison said. He noted that the US government has cut its allocation to the CGIAR by about US$30 million this year, equivalent to eliminating one entire centre and effectively blocking all new research.

"Dr Borlaug has written several letters to the administration asking them to reconsider the decision to cut funding," said Frison. "I hope that with all the promises made here in Rome they will now reconsider."

The Declaration separates immediate and short-term measures from medium- and long-term measures. Among the former, it calls for support to give the worst affected farmers "access to appropriate locally adapted seeds, fertilizers, animal feed and other inputs ... to increase agricultural production."

An Action Plan for coping with the current food price crisis drawn up by the CGIAR Centres and presented to the meeting indicated that this was one area in which the Centres were ready to contribute right now.

"With donor support, CGIAR Centres can certainly provide the seeds, technology and know-how that partners can then use to help farmers increase their harvests," Frison said.

For the medium and long term, the Declaration points out that "it is essential to address the fundamental question of how to increase the resilience of present food production systems to challenges posed by climate change."

"The Declaration says that 'maintaining biodiversity is key to sustaining future production performance'. I'd go further than that. We need to make much greater use of agricultural biodiversity now," Frison said.

"This is a very important point," he continued. "The farming systems of poor people in marginal lands can become more productive and more resilient in the face of external pressures, and not just those of climate change. That will take research, and to do that will take additional investment."

ENDS

For further information, contact Jeremy Cherfas
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Agricultural Researchers Call for a Revolution in Sustainable Agriculture

Earlier Efforts to Achieve Sustainable Agriculture Stalled by Declining Support

Rome, Italy
For immediate release

With the aim of helping avert future food crises, the world’s largest organization dedicated to international agricultural research called today for renewed commitment to a revolution in sustainable agriculture, which was set for success in the 1990s but then stalled as a result of waning financial support.

Just as all the elements needed for such a revolution came together more than a decade ago, support for agriculture, at the international and national levels, went into a tailspin, explained Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity International – one of 15 centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). Frison spoke on behalf of the Alliance of CGIAR Centers during the High-Level Conference on World Food Security: The Challenges of Climate Change and Bio-energy, organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.

Adjusting for inflation and exchange rates, Frison noted, wealthy countries cut their support roughly in half from US$6 billion to $2.8 billion between 1980 and 2006. “The new revolution in sustainable agriculture was essentially put on hold,” he remarked.

“That‘s one of the reasons we’re facing a food price crisis now,” Frison continued. “It also helps explain why we’re not better prepared to confront the impacts of climate change in agriculture. Farmers would be much further along in adapting to those impacts, if more of them had the resilient varieties now available and if more were using improved practices for managing natural resources, including biodiversity, soils, water and small-scale fisheries.”

Beginning in the 1960s, international agricultural research centers later supported by the CGIAR began developing modern varieties of rice and wheat, which made possible the worldwide Green Revolution in agriculture. Responding well to fertilizer, the new varieties gave crop yields a large boost, especially in irrigated areas with uniformly favorable conditions. The steady stream of improved varieties and other technologies had huge impact. For every dollar invested in CGIAR research since 1971, nine dollars worth of additional food has been produced, according to a 2003 study led by Yale economist Robert Evenson.

The Green Revolution even offered environmental benefits, lessening the pressure on fragile land that otherwise would have been brought into cultivation. But it also had environmental costs. More intensive cultivation, without proper resource management, led in many places to severe degradation of soils and water.

By the 1990s, however, the CGIAR had in place a strong program of research to achieve a more sustainable revolution in agriculture. Through that research, they found ways to balance the need for more intensive crop production with the need to protect natural resources. A notable example is the spread of “zero-till” technology in the rice-wheat systems of South Asia’s Indo-Gangetic Plain. Close to half a million farmers are using this technology on more than 3.2 million hectares, according to CGIAR impact reports. Crop yields are higher, and production costs are down, mainly because of savings in energy and water. Economic benefits were estimated several years ago to have reached a total of $147 million.

Increased harvests and steadily declining food prices throughout the 1980s and 1990s lulled donors into complacency about agriculture, Frison commented, and they shifted attention to other development challenges. Despite the funding cuts to agriculture, key research received support and produced important results. For that reason, Frison asserted, the Alliance of CGIAR Centers is ready to help resolve the current food crisis and reduce the risk of future crises through a set of short-, medium- and long-term measures, outlined in an action plan presented at the FAO High-Level Conference.

“We urgently need to accelerate the flow of new varieties tolerant to heat, drought and other stresses that will become worse with climate change,” Frison said. “We must also spread more widely the new tools and methods from research on natural resource management. But there are no simple solutions and no magic bullets.

“Nor should we concentrate just on globally important staples,” Frison added. Locally important crops and livestock, for example millets in India, bananas across much of Africa, and Andean roots and tubers and grains in South America, are often the key source of sustenance for poor, rural people. Production in such systems, which are common in marginal areas, must be increased to improve food security and nutrition for the poorest farmers.

“Success will require a substantial increase in funding and collective action among all key actors and players,” Frison stressed. ”We believe that, in order to deliver the knowledge and technologies required, we must double our annual investment in pro-poor research.” The Alliance will continue to work in concert with other international institutions, such as FAO, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the World Food Programme and World Bank, as well as with many regional, national and local partners.

ENDS

For further information, contact Jeff Haskins,/a> at Burness Communications or Jeremy Cherfas at Bioversity International

About the CGIAR:
The CGIAR, established in 1971, is a strategic partnership of countries, international and regional organizations and private foundations supporting the work of 15 international Centers. In collaboration with national agricultural research systems, civil society and the private sector, the CGIAR fosters sustainable agricultural growth through high-quality science aimed at benefiting the poor through stronger food security, better human nutrition and health, higher incomes and improved management of natural resources. For more information, please visit www.cgiar.org.
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Tailor-made genebank training

Two scientists from the Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute (MARDI), a key Bioversity partner, have just completed three weeks of high-level training at a state of the art genebank in Suwon, South Korea. The genebank is operated by the Rural Development Administration (RDA) of South Korea. Delivering training is one of the goals of an agreement between RDA and Bioversity International.

Zulhairil bin Ariffin and Azuan Bin Amron, researchers at the Strategic Resource Research Centre of MARDI, learned about various aspects of genebank management, including seed processing for storage, use of molecular markers to characterize and evaluate plant genetic resources, documentation and information management and how to develop a genebank operation manual.

Dr Salma Idris, MARDI’s principal research officer, welcomed the training programme. "This will enhance genebank management in Malaysia. It will also complement the establishment of MARDI’s new genebank, set to be completed in 2010 at Serdang, Malaysia and create opportunities to gain new information in addition to what is currently being practiced in the country."

Dr Cho Myoung Rae, a senior RDA scientist, currently on secondment to Bioversity’s regional office in Malaysia agreed. "It is indeed an opportune moment for Bioversity International and RDA to forge closer ties with partners through programmes like these which greatly enhance the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources."

The training will be extended to genebank curators in other countries of the Asia-Pacific-Oceania region. Two to three countries will be selected on a yearly basis, and the programme will be tailor-made to meet specific national needs.

Elizabeth Goldberg, Head of Bioversity's Capacity Development Unit, commented: "We value RDA's important regional collaboration. By offering in-depth, tailor-made training genebank managers in the region will be enabled to manage and use their collections to address pressing needs for greater food security."

For further information, contact Elizabeth Goldberg.

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International Day for Biodiversity in Africa

In Nairobi yesterday Honourable Japhet Kareke Mbiuki, the Assistant Minister of Agriculture and Livestock in charge of Crop Production, launched the Kenyan portion of Diversity for Life, the global communication initiative. Much of the campaign’s work in Kenya will focus on the importance of agricultural biodiversity, and especially traditional African leafy vegetables, in delivering dietary diversity and better nutrition and health. School feeding programmes will be a particular target.

Regional Director Jojo Baidu Forson and Bioversity staff members were interviewed by NTV Kenya. The report stressed the importance of agricultural biodiversity in improving nutrition and health and in boosting self-sufficiency. A diversity exhibit mounted in collaboration with National Museums of Kenya provided a colourful backdrop to the report. You can see the segment on YouTube.

Celebrations in Benin continued this morning, where an Information Sharing break took place over coffee at the offices of the international agricultural research organizations there. A brief presentation to staff at the Africa Rice Centre helped to familiarize them with the importance of biodiversity for humanity, helped by a display of local products that make use of agricultural biodiversity. National and local broadcast media covered the event. The three local CGIAR centres (Africa Rice Centre, Bioversity International and the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture) plan a briefing on agricultural biodiversity for international journalists next week.

For further information, contact Elizabeth Obel-Lawson.

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Bioversity marks International Day for Biodiversity and Agriculture

22 May 2008
Bioversity International and its partners are taking part in several events to mark the International Day of Biodiversity, which this year is dedicated to Biodiversity and Agriculture. Rome sees the launch of a global awareness campaign to heighten appreciation of the importance of agricultural biodiversity.

Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity, said at the launch: "In the build up to the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010, we want politicians, policy-makers and ordinary people to begin to give agricultural biodiversity the attention and respect it deserves. By 2010 we need politicians to be taking serious action to ensure that agricultural biodiversity can be a big part of the solution to the huge challenges we face today. Diversity for Life, the global campaign we are launching tonight, will help them to do so."

Via video, Frison also addressed a side event organised by the Secretariat of the convention on Biological Diversity at the 9th Conference of the Parties to the CBD in Bonn. You can see his presentation here:

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Bioversity and the Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute (MARDI) are hosting a seminar on Agriculture and Biodiversity: New Challenges and Emerging Issues, which coincides with the launching of a book on Agrobiodiversity in Malaysia.

In Latin America Bioversity International and its partners are staging several events for the day. In Ecuador, DENAREF is hosting an open house and press conference dedicated to agricultural biodiversity and how it can be used to fight the food price crisis and the loss of local underused species. INIFAT in Cuba, which worked with Bioversity on a home gardens project, is organizing a diversity fair with farmers who are part of an in-situ conservation project. And in Colombia, the Instituto Humboldt will hold a series of lectures in different cities. Peru will celebrate International Day for Biodiversity at the national Potato Congress in Huancayo. In addition, INRENA (the National Institute of Natural Resources) will celebrate the day in Lima. A much larger celebration, featuring a fair with native products, farmers offering local products for sale and culinary displays (supported by Gastrotur and the Ministry of Tourism) is being organized for June 21st, to coincide with the Farmers’ Day celebration.

"This list of some of the events celebrating Biodiversity and Agriculture Day is a great demonstration of the importance of agricultural biodiversity," said Emile Frison. "Of course agrobiodiversity is important for breeding, but its scope goes much further. Agricultural biodiversity also delivers better nutrition and health. It makes harvests more sustainable and minimizes the risk of failure. It offers income-earning opportunities and is especially valuable to the poorest people on the most marginal lands. It confers greater sustainability on farming systems. And in the medium term, it will be absolutely essential to cope with climate change. That’s a pretty important list."

For further information, contact Jeremy Cherfas. Permalink

Diversity for Life: Global campaign launched in Rome

Rome, Italy
Embargoed until 00.01 CEST, 22 May 2008
[Italian]

A global campaign to draw attention to the importance of agricultural biodiversity for human survival and well-being will be launched at 18.30 CEST today in Rome. A round table, moderated by the renowned Italian television and radio journalist Emanuela Falcetti, and a performance by the world-famous Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio, will kicked off a two and a half year effort to ensure that agricultural biodiversity is recognized as the very basis of human culture and development.

This launch event is a result of collaboration between Bioversity International and the Institute of Science and Nutrition of Italy’s National Research Council, which was responsible for selecting the Italian scientists for the round table.

"Culture depends on agriculture, which gave people the leisure to develop art, philosophy, science and all the other activities we take for granted in a civilized society," said Dr Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity International in opening the programme. "And agriculture depends on biodiversity."

The campaign, Diversity for Life, is being launched on 22 May, the International Day for Biodiversity, which this year is devoted to biodiversity and agriculture. Simultaneous launch events are taking place in key countries -- among them Kenya, Malaysia and Uzbekistan -- to launch national and regional communications initiatives. The global campaign will culminate in 2010, which has been designated the International Year of Biodiversity.

Agricultural biodiversity is made up of the various ecosystems, plants, animals and microbes that support human life with food, fibres, building materials and such like. Plant and animal diversity – the many different kinds of apples, or cattle breeds, for example– is the product of generations of breeding and selection by farmers and, more recently, scientific breeders and is the foundation of all improvements to crops and livestock.

"This is not just about breeding," said Emile Frison, "although that is certainly important. Agricultural biodiversity also delivers better nutrition and health. It makes harvests more sustainable and minimizes the risk of failure. It offers income-earning opportunities and is especially valuable to the poorest people on the most marginal lands. It confers greater sustainability on farming systems. And in the medium term, it will be absolutely essential to cope with climate change. That’s a pretty important list."

Speakers at the round table will address a range of topics concerned with agriculture and biodiversity. Among them, Professor Giovanni Aliotta of the Institute of Science and Nutrition and lecturer at the Second University of Naples in Caserta will discuss the links between biodiversity and what he calls "agri … culture," echoing the idea that culture, diversity and agriculture are inextricably intertwined.

Professor Gian Tommaso Scarascia Mugnozza, President of the National Academy of Sciences, will cover Italy’s contribution to international efforts on agricultural biodiversity.

Philosophical question will be addressed too. Aldo Masullo, professor emeritus at the Federico II Unversity in Naples will discuss the right to diversity, while writer Beppe Bigazzi asks about population and biodiversity: is there enough to nourish everyone?

"There is more to this than science and philosophy. We also want to celebrate the human diversity and culture that springs from agricultural riches," said Ruth Raymond, Head of the Public Awareness Unit at Bioversity International and Co-ordinator of the global campaign. "I’m thrilled that the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio has agreed to play for us. They are a living embodiment of everything the campaign is about: diversity, culture and celebration."

"Our health also depends on biodiversity," explained Antonio Malorni, director of the CNR’s Institute of Science and Nutrition, "because the golden rule for healthy living is to eat little but to eat the greatest diversity possible."

Participants in the round table will also see a short film that explores the relationship between members of the Orchestra and food. What do they miss about home cooking? And what do they think of Italy’s cuisine?

"There is a very serious message in all of this," stressed Emile Frison. "In the build up to the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010, we want politicians, policy-makers and ordinary people to begin to give agricultural biodiversity the attention and respect it deserves. It is, quite literally, the basis of future human prosperity and survival, and with all the challenges pressing down on us, we continue to ignore it at our peril."

Note to Editors
Bioversity International is the world’s largest organization dedicated to the use and conservation of agricultural biodiversity. It is one of the centres supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research.
The launch event is supported by the President of the Republic of Italy and by:
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)
Consiglio Nationale delle Richerche (CNR)
Istituto Agronomico per l’Oltromare (IAO)
Ecoagriculture Partners
Roma Congressi
With the additional support of Italy’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Forests, Ministry of Health, Ministry of the Environment, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Culture.
Other supporters include Accademia Nazionale delle Scienze, Consiglio per la Ricerca e la Sperimentazione in Agricoltura (CRA), Istituto Nationale di Ricerca per gli Alimentazi e la Nutrizione (INRAN) and Countdown 2010 (IUCN).

For further information, contact Ruth Raymond.
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Bioversity Director General discusses the food price crisis

Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity International, was recently interviewed by the French language service of Radio Canada. He explained some of the factors behind the recent rise in food prices and spoke of some approaches to tackle the problems, including more money for agricultural research for development and the need to use biodiversity to tackle malnutrition.

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One stop shop for information on crop wild relatives

For immediate release
Rome, Italy
A Global Portal that offers a wealth of information on wild relatives of crops will be launched on 20 May in Bonn, Germany at the 9th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity. By making such information widely accessible the Crop Wild Relatives (CWR) Global Portal will contribute to more effective conservation and sustainable use of wild relatives through better-informed decision making by policymakers, researchers and conservationists. The portal is part of a five-year project with five countries -- Armenia, Bolivia, Madagascar, Sri Lanka and Uzbekistan -- implemented by Bioversity International with funding provided by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and implementation support from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Crop wild relatives are a vital weapon in the fight for global food security. Wild relatives of plants such as potato and wheat contain genes that confer resistance to devastating pests and diseases or permit them to survive extreme drought and temperatures. These traits can be bred into crops to confer those essential characteristics as well and others such as enhanced nutritional quality. Crop wild relatives will be an increasingly important line of defence in helping adapt crops to changing climatic conditions.

"Climate change, increasing demand for food and increasing prices for fossil fuels make it more urgent that we conserve crop wild relatives, especially in situ, under natural conditions to ensure that the evolutionary processes that result in their many beneficial traits are able to continue," said Danny Hunter, Global Coordinator of the project.

"We are launching the Global Portal at the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity precisely because it is a landmark event in the conservation of biological diversity," said Hunter. "Natural populations of crop wild relatives are at great risk, primarily from habitat loss but increasingly from climate change. To ensure their availability to enhance future agricultural yields, we must strive for effective conservation of crop wild relatives, but that is a challenge because the information about them is not readily available. The Global Portal is an important step in addressing this challenge."

The range of information available through the CWR Global Portal covers ex situ conservation, taxonomy, conservation status and distribution, relevant contacts, literature sources, latest news and photos. Information sources include the project’s country partners, international partners (BGCI, FAO, IUCN, and UNEP-WCMC), and data from other countries, accessible via the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).

"The five country partners in the project have carried out significant in situ conservation and management actions focusing on 36 genera of crop wild relatives. Establishing effective partnerships and collaborations between relevant groups and stakeholders, they have been able to set priorities, undertake national surveys and develop national inventories and databases, and have been active in public awareness and integrating material on wild relatives into national educational curricula," said Hunter. "These countries are committed to sharing this information with the international community in the hope that it increases awareness and understanding of crop wild relatives, demonstrates how to ensure their effective conservation and encourages other countries to do likewise."

Note to Editors:
The Crop Wild Relatives Project
In situ conservation of Crop Wild Relatives Through Enhanced Information Management and Field Application is being implemented in five countries – Armenia, Bolivia, Madagascar, Sri Lanka and Uzbekistan. The project is coordinated by Bioversity International with financing from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and implementation support from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Additional funding from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ); co-funding from all partners.

For further information, contact Danny Hunter (Project Coordinator)
Tel: +39.066118316 email: d.hunter@cgiar.org

www.cropwildrelatives.org

International Partners

• Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI)


• Federal Agency for Agriculture and Food (BLE), Germany


• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)


• International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)


• UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC)

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COP 9 Documentation Centre

Bioversity International is working with partners within and without the CGIAR to coordinate a presence for agricultural biodiversity at the 9th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, being held in Bonn, Germany, from 19 to 30 May 2008.

On this page we hope to make available any documents produced in that context.


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Centre Directors General discuss food prices

Emile Frison, Director General of Bioversity International and Robert Zeigler, Director General of the International Rice Research Institute, briefed the press in Canada during a meeting of the CGIAR in Ottawa. One article can be found here.
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Bioversity International awards two research fellowships

For immediate release
Rome, Italy

Bioversity International’s Board of Trustees recently approved two Vavilov-Frankel Fellowships for research into agricultural biodiversity. Enoch G. Achigan-Dako, of Benin, will study watermelon and its wild relatives with a view to improving conservation and use of genetic diversity. Dorin Gupta, from India, plans to mine the genome of Medicago truncatula (barrel medic) in search of markers that can be used in lentil breeding. The Fellowships are intended to advance the careers of younger scientists from developing countries by enabling them to carry out relevant, innovative research outside their own countries. Research must also be valuable and applicable to the home country.

Medicago trunculata was selected as a model legume for genome sequencing and the results are now being used to further research in many areas. Gupta will work with Dr Paul Taylor at BioMarka at the University of Melbourne in Australia, looking for markers in medic that could help to identify useful genes in lentil, especially wild relatives. Cultivated lentil diversity is not all that broad, and Gupta’s previous research has been somewhat hampered by the lack of useful variability from which to breed improved varieties. Although she has had some success with using wild lentils to improve cultivated varieties, Gupta believes that molecular markers will improve the efficiency of lentil breeding by enabling her and all breeders to target genes of interest. Gupta will be co-supervised by Sarkar Ashutosh, a lentil breeder at the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), which will also be supplying some of the materials for the study in Australia.

For most people watermelon (Citrullus lanatus) is first and foremost a juicy, refreshing fruit associated with hot summer days. In west Africa, however, there are species of C. lanatus and its close wild relative C. colocynthis that have bitter, inedible flesh. Both species are widely used as sources of proteins, vitamins and oil, and also provide an income for small farmers. Some researchers have taken that as evidence that watermelon was domesticated in Africa. However, the situation is unclear, with the relationship between C. lanatus and C. colocynthis confused, and several other species or subspecies adding to the confusion. Achigan-Dako plans to use molecular tools to characterize various species of melon collected in Africa and elsewhere and to use the data to build a better tree of family relationships among the various groups. This will help both to conserve genetic diversity and to make use of that diversity, for example by breeding new watermelon varieties with seeds appropriate for infant food, an increasingly important use in sub-Saharan Africa. Achigan-Dako will be hosted by the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Research at Gatersleben in Germany.

Dr Olga Linares, leader of the Bioversity Board’s Fellowships Task Group, commented that all the short-listed applications had been strong, and both of the chosen applications were very good.

"I am very happy with the quality of our Vavilov-Frankel Fellows again this year," said Elizabeth Goldberg, head of training at Bioversity. "In future we hope to be able to strengthen the programme even further."

Note to editors:
The Vavilov-Frankel Fellowships were established in 1989 to commemorate the achievements of Academician Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov and Sir Otto Frankel. The Fellowships are supported by the Grains Research and Development Corporation in Australia and Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc in the USA. For further information, visit the Fellowship web site.
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Forestry fellowship: call for applications

Bioversity International invites young African scientists to apply for the Abdou-Salam Ouédraogo Fellowship, which offers support for research on conservation and use of forest genetic resources. For full details of the fellowship and how to apply, see Bioversity's Training web site. Closing date for applications is 30 May 2008.
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