Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations  
International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture

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    The Inventory

    This online version of the Inventory presents, for each measure, the title and a brief description with information on implementing organization(s), start year, objectives, core elements, key outcomes, and, if applicable, lessons learned. It thus allows users to quickly identify those examples that may be of interest to them. A hyperlink to the original submission is provided, which includes additional information, such as on the history and context of the presented measure, challenges encountered, or target groups reached. In this way, users can get a more comprehensive idea of the measure in question and the specific context for which it was developed.
     
    To facilitate navigation, the Inventory is subdivided into eleven categories. Measures or practices that fall under more than one category are listed under each one that applies. Furthermore, information is provided on the type(s) of measures that are typically involved, such as technical, administrative, legal, and/or others, and on the relevant sub-article of Article 9 that is addressed. Additional search options allow searching by country, region, free text and keyword.
     
     
     
     
     
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    Number of records: 233

    136) Federal Advisory Committee – Plant Variety Protection Board

    The U.S. government has several federal advisory committees that provide opportunities for farmers to participate in making decisions related to the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources, including the Plant Variety Protection Board (PVPB), established in 1970. The PVPB advises the Secretary of Agriculture concerning the adoption of rules and regulations to facilitate the proper administration of the Plant Variety Protection Act; makes advisory decisions for the Secretary on appeals concerning decisions on applications by the Plant Variety Protection Office and on requests for emergency public-interest compulsory licenses; and advises the Secretary on any other matters under the rules and regulations.

    Category: 8.Farmers’ participation in decision-making at local, national and sub-regional, regional and international levels

    Type of measure/practice: Administrative

    137) Strengthening capacities through courses, workshops, brochures, and others

    Since 1995, through a series of projects, the Instituto de Investigaciones Fundamentales en Agricultura Tropical ‘Alejandro de Humboldt' (INIFAT), together with other government and non-government organizations, has engaged in in situ conservation activities in two Biosphere Reserves. In the first year of each project, the research team would conduct a diagnosis to identify training needs; this course of action has allowed them to develop short courses, workshops and brochures to address farmers’ needs. Such as, workshops to consolidate knowledge on seed production and storage, soil management and seed storage and conservation; promotion of knowledge sharing and exchange of experiences among all participants; dissemination of successful experiences, all of which, are conducted in a participatory manner This has allowed to strengthen and revive traditional knowledge in the communities where projects have been implemented. The continuous sharing of knowledge and exchange of experiences between and among farmers and researchers has laid the ground for identifying gaps that need to be filled in the short and medium term in these rural areas to better focus training activities and/or new interventions that promote the conservation and sustainable use of agrobiodiversity in the country.

    Category: 9.Training, capacity development and public awareness creation

    Type of measure/practice: Technical

    138) National Plant Germplasm System

    The earliest components of today’s NPGS date to 1898 and the USDA Plant Exploration Office and the National Small Grain Collection, with major expansions in the late 1940s with the establishment of four regional plant introduction stations and the interregional potato station, the National Seed Storage Laboratory (now the National Laboratory for Genetic Resources Preservation) in 1958, the cotton and soybean germplasm collection in the 1970s, and the mid-1980s with the addition of nine genebank sites with primarily clonally-propagated crops. Currently the NPGS comprises 20 different genebank sites, the GRIN-Global information management system, and 43 Crop Germplasm Committees.

    Category: 6.Facilitation of farmers’ access to a diversity of PGRFA through community seed banks, seed networks and other measures improving farmers’ choices of a wider diversity of PGRFA.

    Type of measure/practice: Technical; Administrative

    139) Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN)

    The Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN)-Global system, originally developed in 1986 and updated and expanded in 2011, is a suite of software programmes for managing plant germplasm-associated information, facilitating plant genebank workflows, and providing a public interface for users to access plant germplasm and information. Users can search for accession information via its public website, fill a shopping cart with their desired plant germplasm, and have it delivered freely and without restrictions for use in plant production, research and breeding. In fact, in 2018 alone, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) distributed over 280,000 samples to fill more than 700 individual orders.

    Category: 6.Facilitation of farmers’ access to a diversity of PGRFA through community seed banks, seed networks and other measures improving farmers’ choices of a wider diversity of PGRFA.

    Type of measure/practice: Technical; Administrative

    140) Strengthening community resilience through in situ conservation and management of crop diversity for food security

    The Instituto de Investigaciones Fundamentales en Agricultura Tropical ‘Alejandro de Humboldt’ (INIFAT), together with other partners, received financial support from the Benefit-sharing Fund of the International Treaty. One of the funded projects addressed the ‘Contribution of traditional methods for the in situ conservation and management of maize (Zea mays L.) and beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) to the food security of peasant families executed in 2011 to 2012 provided an in-depth information of crops’ characterisics based on farmers’ perceptions. The project enabled to document corn and bean varieties and the traditional farming system in rural areas, while also providing training workshops, agrobiodiversity fairs and culinary festivals to promote awareness among communities regarding the importance of in situ conservation of crops. Through these activities, farmers were motivated to rescue the ‘lost’ cultivars; non-academic workshops were important tools for the dissemination of good practices of relevance for interested farmers. A second project commences in 2019, aims to strengthen community resilience and improve food security of farming communities in two Biosphere Reserves through in situ conservation and sustainable use of crop diversity. It will support farming community in crop improvement, strengthening community seed bank and networks, and organization of seed fairs and culinary festivals.

    Category: 5.In-situ/on farm conservation and management of PGRFA, such as social and cultural measures, community biodiversity management and conservation sites

    Type of measure/practice: Technical; Others