Abstract only

Soil Borne Pathogens (SBPs), including the Dryland Root Rot and Cereal Nematodes, cause economic yield loss in many parts of the world where cereals are the predominant cropping system and the crop is grown under sub-optimal growing conditions, particularly drought/moisture stress. In these systems, the option to use crop rotation with nonhosts is limited and, therefore, one of the most cost effective, safe and logical options is the use of genetic host resistance, whereby the inoculum of these SBPs can be reduced below economically damaging thresholds. Another challenge is that one or more of these SBPs are commonly found together and, hence, the need to multiple SBP resistance is also important. For more than 6 years, CIMMYT under the ICWIP (ICARDA CIMMYT Wheat Improvement Program) in collaboration with the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture has been actively working on the identification of resistant wheat germplasm from a range of National and International advanced wheat lines. Work in Turkey has focussed o n the Crown Rot (CR) species F. culmorum, whereas, in many other regions this and a closely related species F. pseudograminearum have been reported and researched. CR causes significant economic losses, particularly in rainfed wheat conditions and many regions including West Asia, North Africa, Latin and North America, Europe and Australia (1). Similarly, several species of the two important Cereal Nematodes, Cereal Cyst Nematode (CCN- Heterodera spp.) and Root Lesion Nematode (RLN- Pratylenchus spp.), have been reported to have a global distribution and be economically important, particularly under drought conditions (3). Furthermore, recent studies have confirmed more widespread distribution of, and yield loss caused by both Cereal Nematodes in important wheat growing regions (4). The objective of this study was to validate and identify adapted high yielding wheats with resistance against multiple SBPs and also confirm their potential useability in other wheat growing regions.

Global Wheat Program

Text in English

INT2918|INT2410

CIMMYT Staff Publications Collection