Global Strategy for the Ex Situ Conservation of Potato - Global Crop ...

7. Priorities proposed for support by the Trust
The priorities described below have been selected in the Lima workshop. The consultant
responsible for this draft potato genetic resources strategy explicitly agrees with this
selection. The motives for this selection have been addressed below.
In establishing priorities for a rational system qualifying for support by the Trust, it was
assumed that support may be provided in the form of either support to collaborative projects
of several genebanks, contributing to genebank functions of common interest, such as
regeneration, rationalisation, database development, safety duplication and improved health
status of collections; or, alternatively, support for capacity building and upgrading of
individual genebanks to correct apparent constraints regarding facilities, training and
temporary actions to improvement of some genebank functions (see Table 2).
7.1 Considerations used in the priority setting process.
Main considerations in the selection of priorities were the needs to:
! to optimise documentation of the collections, in order to improve accessibility, and as a
tool for management of the collections from a global perspective;
! to create better storage conditions;
! to improve the level of safety duplication;
! to avoid loss of unique material;
! to rationalise collections by reducing undesirable duplication, in particular of native
cultivars;
! to set standards for collection management; and
! to create better conditions for use by clients.
The above considerations were taken into account in discussing proposals for collaborative
projects as well as for individual support to genebanks.
7.2 Proposed priority actions and summary of pre-proposals.
Collaborative actions
The potato curators participating in the Lima workshop initially selected five actions from the
nine elements recognized as forming part of a rational system (see 6.6). Pre-proposals for
consideration by the Trust were formulated in parallel working groups and presented in a
plenary session to all curators for discussion and final adoption.
The five pre-proposals proposed for support by the Trust concern:
1. the development of two comprehensive World Potato Genetic Resources Databases for
wild species and native cultivars respectively;
2. the establishment of guidelines for effective management of potato genetic resources
collections
3. the rationalisation of native cultivars collections;
4. the urgent regeneration of endangered accessions; and
5. the health improvement of potato germplasm maintained in the collections.
The five pre-proposals are presented in detail in Annex 7.
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