Wild Plants from Four Continents Deliver Climate Change Lifeline for Crops

Over one hundred scientists from 25 countries on four continents took part in a six-year quest to collect the wild plant species that scientists and breeders can use to make our crops more productive in increasingly challenging climates. The researchers secured 4,644 seed samples of 371 crop wild relatives—many endangered—of 28 globally important crops. The samples are now safely stored in national and international genebanks, where they have boosted the world’s shared collection of plant genetic resources. They are also now available to breeders and farmers everywhere as governed by the Food and Agriculture Organization’s International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.