AgriTech News Item 9, 15 November 2019

Research Results

1. A step toward controlling soybean rust:

Soybean rust, a disease caused by two types of fungi, Phakopsora pachyrhizi (Asian soybean rust) and P.meibomiae (New World soybean rust), has been reported across Asia, Australia, Africa, South America, and the United States. Severe yield losses (10-80%) have been reported from this disease, especially due to the latter fungus. Among U.S. soybean growers,the disease has so far had a major impact only in the frost-free south. But according to Glen Hartman, plant pathologist in the Department of Crop Sciences at the University of Illinois, it can extend to other warmer regions of the USA and in other countries, as it has been causing significant losses in Africa. Although the disease can be controlled by fungicides, spraying on millions of hectares of soybean is not only unsustainable but will also damage the environment. Developing resistant varieties is the way forward. With that objective, Sebastien Duplessis of the French National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA) has proposed sequencing a reference genome for P. pachyrhizi, as part of the Joint Genome Institute’s (JGI) 2016 Community Science Program portfolio. All available data from an international consortium’s efforts to sequence three P. pachyrhizi isolates, including the one from JGI, are accessible on the JGI’s fungal portal MycoCosm at https://mycocosm.jgi.doe.gov/Phapa1.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-10-soybean-rust.html,

and https://phys.org/news/2017-06-soybean-rust-breeders-tailor-resistant.html

2. Ways to improve cassava, a ‘crop of inequality’:

At the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s third annual Goalkeepers event in New York City, University of Illinois scientist Amanda De Souza highlighted a crop of inequality, called cassava. Cassava has starchy, tuberous roots that sustain more than 500 million people in sub-Saharan Africa, yet it has been largely neglected by research and development compared to the staple crops of wealthier regions. Cassava is a back-up crop for thousands of smallholder farmers, who depend on small plots of land to feed and support their families when other crops fail. De Souza has been working on improving cassava through Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE), and the results have been published in New Phytologist, identifying opportunities to improve cassava yields. Led by RIPE researchers at Illinois and Lancaster University, this study examined factors that limit photosynthesis in 11 popular, or farmer-preferred, African varieties of cassava, with the goal to eventually help cassava overcome photosynthetic limitations to boost yields.

For more, go to https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190925092356.htm

and

https://nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/nph.16142

3. Harnessing tomato “jumping genes” could help speed-breed drought-resistant crops:

Once dismissed as ‘junk DNA’ that served no purpose, a family of ‘jumping genes’ found in tomatoes has the potential to accelerate crop breeding for traits such as improved drought resistance. According to Dr Matthias Benoit, formerly at University of Cambridge’s Sainsbury Laboratory (SLCU), transposons, which are powerful drivers of trait diversity, have a huge potential for crop improvement. Transposons, more commonly called jumping genes, are mobile snippets of DNA code that can copy themselves into new positions within the genome.

Such jumping genes could be used to generate new characteristics, which will be a significant leap forward from traditional breeding techniques, as it would help to rapidly generate new traits (e.g., shapes, colours, and sizes) to make harvesting more efficient and maximize yield. Transposon activity is a native tool already present within the plant, which can be harnessed to generate new phenotypes or resistances and complement gene-targeting efforts.

For more, go to

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190916143949.htm,

and

https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1008370&type=printable

Potential Crops/Technology

1. Roles that Robots and IoT Will Play in the Future of Farming:

Farmers have always been diligent data collectors, knowing approximately what each acreage yields or how much milk an individual cow produces. But with the complex data-collecting devices of today’s world, agriculture is in the midst of a high-tech revolution—particularly in the area of precision farming. Robots can pick fruits and pull out weeds; LiDAR—or light detection and ranging—technology can collect data from a field’s hard-to-reach understory; drones can do 3D-imaging, map-building, and crop monitoring; farming exoskeletons can help aged farmers to work in the fields; and robots can be used also for livestock management and monitoring, including health of animals, and for monitoring climate.

Although the Internet of Things (IoT) is still nascent in India, the country is witnessing an IoT revolution and the technology is being deployed across various fields, including agriculture. With the rapid technological advancements in hand, the opportunities in IoT are bound to grow over the next few years. IoT has the potential to transform agriculture in several aspects. Some of the major benefits of IoT in agriculture include a decrease in production risks and generation of big data for larger production output. With the incorporation of IoT, one can maintain control of the internal processes and reduce production risks.

For more, go to

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/five-roles-robots-will-play-future-farming-180973242/?utm_source=smithsoniandaily&utm_medium,

and https://www.techiexpert.com/iot-for-agriculture-shaping-the-future-of-farming-india-to-witness-remarkable-growth/, andhttp://www.millenniumpost.in/opinion/developing-smart-farms-374113

2. Insects might soon be trained to protect crops:

Safeguarding food security for current and future generations is one of the biggest challenges that humanity faces. There is not much land left for expanding agriculture, especially considering the pressures of climate change. Hence saving crop losses is an important aspect of crop production. One way to achieve higher yields will be reducing crop losses caused by pests, including insects. For instance, in cereal crops such as rice and maize, which are staple foods for a large part of the world’s population, it has been estimated that insect attacks result in up to 15% crop losses.

Although many pests can be kept in check using various chemicals, spraying millions of hectares of cropland is neither economical nor environmentally sustainable. Thus, adding biological control to the arsenal is a better choice. Natural enemies of insect pests include predators, pathogens, and parasitoids. Parasitoids are very diverse, and they constitute a staggering number of insect species. These forage for carbohydrate-rich food, such as floral nectar. If we want to help out parasitoids in the field, in order to increase their numbers and thus help them control pests, we need to know more about how the microbial cues produced by nectar yeasts influence learning of floral preferences by parasitoids. Frequent visits by parasitoids to flowers predisposes them to learn and remember the smell of tasty, energy-rich nectar produced by yeast. This could improve the foraging efficiency of trained parasitoids and increase their overall efficacy in suppressing aphid populations.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-09-insects-crops.html?utm_source=nwletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=daily-nwletter

3. Can CRISPR technology be used not just for crop improvement, but also for saving biodiversity?

In 2012, scientists first described the gene-editing capabilities of Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR), a molecular tool that can be used to make targeted, precise changes to the DNA of plants, animals, and microbes. Since then, scientists have proposed myriad ways to use the technology. But could it be a boon to biodiversity? Can it help researchers understand and preserve corals and their ecosystems? What about applications to diversify agriculture to shore up food security? Or to combat invasive species plaguing ecosystems around the world?

In the future, domesticating new plant species─potentially with gene editing─might give farmers more options for growing diverse crops well-suited to specific climates.With the 2018 announcement that scientists have used CRISPR to edit genes in coral, gene editing is seen as a potential strategy. However, the effects of human interventions are not always predictable, and predicting impacts of the release of a gene-edited species into the wild will be difficult. Hence some conservation scientists, for example, Toni Piaggio, a research scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Wildlife Research Center, say that there are reasons to be very concerned about the technology.

Initially, the scientists plan to use CRISPR to understand, in a laboratory setting, which genes are important for handling stress in the environment and use that information to help conservation efforts. Gene drives, which have become more plausible with the advent of gene editing, could offer a more humane way of managing invasive populations and protecting the species they endanger.

For more, go to https://ensia.com/features/crispr-biodiversity-coral-food-agriculture-invasive-species/

News

1. New arhar (pigeonpea) crop variety is a double-income dream for Indian farmers:

The Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) is set to release a variety of arhar (tur/pigeon pea) in the market, which produces double the yield of its predecessors and also has a shorter cultivation period. After Pusa 991 and Pusa 992, the new Pusa Arhar-16 could prove to be a game-changer for Indian farmers. This new cultivar requires only 120 days for maturity (compared to 200-280 days required for traditional varieties) and can be sown in late June or early July and harvested in October. Hence a farmer can cultivate the crop twice and double the yield or sow cash crops like vegetables or spices after its harvest.

For more, go to https://theprint.in/india/new-arhar-crop-variety-double-income-dream-for-indian-farmers/302342/

 

 

2. Problems in/potential for exploiting the of GM crops in India:

Seventeen scientists, who consistently advocated Genetically Modified (GM) crops in India, are anxious to revive GMs despite the Centre’s growing emphasis on organic farming to boost nutritional standards nationwide. The Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana and the Rashtriya Gokul Mission are gaining popularity among farmers. Alarmed at the scale of soil degradation in the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his Independence Day address, urged the farmers to reduce the consumption of chemical fertilizers by at least 25 percent.

One group of scientists claim that the pro-GM scientists are deliberately ignoring the fact that the department-related parliamentary standing committee on Science & Technology, Environment & Forests (August 25, 2017) had asserted that no GM crop should be introduced in India until the bio-safety and long-term effects are evaluated by an independent and transparent process. At the same time, pro-GM group scientists are concerned that India is unable to exploit the potential of GM crops for the benefit of farmers and they claim tht India does not have a clear stand on the release and consumption of GM food crops. The pro-GM group alos arfues that the decisions by the Standing Committee are not based on sound scientific principles and that the activism against GM crops has successfully prevented the exploitation of a powerful technology. This ambivalence could seriously affect India’s food security in the future.

For more, go to https://www.dailypioneer.com/2019/columnists/perils-of-gm-farming.html,

and

https://www.currentscience.ac.in/Volumes/117/03/0390.pdf

 

3. Groups developing updated agenda for organic research:

World over, interest in organic agriculture is growing, including in the USA. However, much of the research needed to address the issues related to this specialized agricultural technology is not addressed in a strategic manner. “Understanding the research needs of organic farmers, including in the area of seed and plant breeding, is critical to the ongoing growth and success of organic agriculture,” Kiki Hubbard, co-leader of the Organic Seed Alliance’s State of Organic Seed project, said in a press release.

For more, go to https://www.thepacker.com/article/groups-developing-updated-agenda-organic-research

 

 

4. Zimbabwe adopts a new strategy to protect indigenous seeds:

Zimbabwe has adopted a new strategic plan on native agricultural crops and wild plants that will, among other things, protect the rights of small farmers to breed their own seed—something considered important to coping with climate change. The National Strategy and Action Plan for Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (PGRFA) is based on the protection of Farmers’ Rights.

For more, go to https://www.herald.co.zw/zimbabwe-adopts-new-strategy-to-protect-indigenous-seeds/

 

 

5. ‘Edible forests’ can fight land clearing and world hunger at the same time:

Reducing emissions from deforestation and farming is an urgent global priority if we want to control climate change. However, like many climate change problems, the solution is complicated. Cutting down forests to plant edible crops feeds some of the world’s hungriest people is not a solution. Villagers in the Himalayas are turning to a traditional practice that can slow land clearing and feed people: growing and collecting food from the forests.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-09-edible-forests-world-hunger.html?utm_source=nwletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=daily-nwletter

 

 

 

 

6. IAEA, FAO Help Develop Bananas Resistant to Major Fungal Disease:

Bananas may be the world’s favourite fruit, but plantations worldwide are increasingly under threat from a new fungus, which destroys banana plants threatening farmers’ livelihoods and the industry. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)─in cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)─has worked with researchers from all around the world to support the development of new varieties of various banana species that would be resistant to the disease.

For more, go to https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-fao-help-develop-bananas-resistant-to-major-fungal-disease

 

 

Events

1. ICPBSST 2020: International Conference on Plant Breeding, Seed Science and Technology, 9-10 January 2020, Singapore. For more, go to https://waset.org/plant-breeding-seed-science-and-technology-conference-in-january-2020-in-singapore
2. 4th International Conference on Climate Change 2020 (ICCC 2020), 27–28 February 2020, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. For more, go to https://climatechangeconferences.com/?gclid=Cj0KCQjwi7DtBRCLARIsAGCJWBqG7B7mE0C3RsHD0kdf-KD9uGKpM8Go73zOrakt3bLBm-VnixjcETgaAhorEALw_wcB
3. 7th Annual Congress on Plant Science and Molecular Biology, 18-19 May 2020, Auckland, New Zealand. For more, go to https://world.plantscienceconferences.com/