As the effects of climate change begin to be felt on yield stability, it is becoming essential to... more As the effects of climate change begin to be felt on yield stability, it is becoming essential to promote the use of genetic diversity in farmers’ fields. The presence of genetic variability in variety could fulfil this purpose. Indeed, the level of intra-varietal genetic diversity influences the spatio-temporal stability of yields and the disease susceptibility of crop species. Breeding history of varieties and their management practices are two factors that should influence intra-varietal genetic diversity. This paper describes the genetic diversity of eight wheat samples covering a gradient from modern single varieties to on-farm mixtures of landraces. This gradient discriminates between landrace, historical and modern varieties, considering the breeding history of varieties, between single-varieties and mixtures of varieties, and between ex situ and in situ de facto strategy in terms of management practices. Genetic diversity of these samples was analyzed with the help of 41 sin...
Consideree comme mineure lors de la redaction de la Charte nationale des ressources genetiques en... more Consideree comme mineure lors de la redaction de la Charte nationale des ressources genetiques en 1998, la gestion a la ferme a depuis gagne en importance et en reconnaissance. En effet, apres les associations de jardiniers amateurs, des reseaux d'agriculteurs se sont federes en France autour de systemes mutualistes de selection/conservation de la diversite cultivee. Parallelement, la contribution des paysans a la gestion dynamique de l'agrobiodiversite a ete scientifiquement et institutionnellement reconnue. Ces elements nous ont conduit a examiner les complementarites dans la gestion des ressources genetiques a la ferme et en collection. Cette etude, qui croise des approches ethnobotanique et genetique, a ete menee sur le ble tendre pour lequel il existe en France une collection nationale de 10 000 accessions et un reseau actif d'agriculteurs-collectionneurs de varietes. Pour la variete Rouge de Bordeaux, nous avons tente de caracteriser la diversite dans les champs et...
De nombreuses etudes realisees sur les systemes d'agriculture traditionnelle ont montre que l... more De nombreuses etudes realisees sur les systemes d'agriculture traditionnelle ont montre que les pratiques paysannes de gestion des especes cultivees constituaient la cle de l’adaptation locale tout en permettant de conserver la diversite genetique, grâce a la coexistence de l'ensemble des processus evolutifs. Quelle diversite initiale est la plus appropriee pour cette gestion dynamique, et quelles modalites de gestion peut‐on recommander pour la preservation du potentiel evolutif de ces populations et de la diversite genetique a l'echelle globale ? Nous nous posons ces questions dans le contexte de l'agriculture francaise : en collaboration avec des paysans en agriculture biologique, nous evaluant dans des varietes de ble de pays les effets de la selection naturelle et de la selection dirigee par les paysans sur l'adaptation et la diversite phenotypique et genetique. En etablissant des liens entre chercheurs et paysans, le projet vise a developper des methodes de...
Mixed cropping is the simultaneous cultivation of different crop species in the same field at the... more Mixed cropping is the simultaneous cultivation of different crop species in the same field at the same time. Especially combina-tions of legume with non-legume plants provide agronomic advan-tages, such as increased productivity and higher yield stability under low-inputs conditions. In mixed cropping, choosing the right cultivars is crucial for the performance of the crop, as shown for e.g. maize with bean by Hoppe (2016). As performance in pure stand can strongly diverge from performance in mixture, estimating the ability of a cultivar to be mixed with another crop is therefore of utmost importance. For this purpose, concepts of general and specific combining abili-ty from hybrid breeding have been adapted to cultivar and crop mixtures. Thus, these effects are called general mixing ability (GMA) and specific mixing ability (SMA). The harvest of most inter-specific mixtures can be separated due to different grain sizes. This fact allows to access valuable information about competit...
Wheat is a staple food in many diets and is currently cultivated worldwide. It provides a large p... more Wheat is a staple food in many diets and is currently cultivated worldwide. It provides a large proportion of the daily energy intake and contributes to food balance. Changes in agro-industrial practices in the bread sector, from the field to bread-making, have led to an increase in chronic diseases and nutritional deficits, emphasizing the link between food and health. Several levers could be used to improve the nutritional quality of bread wheat. Organic farming, by avoiding the use of pesticides, might allow for greater consumption of wholegrain products. Breeding wheat cultivars with an enhanced mineral content may serve as another lever. In this context, the on-farm participatory plant-breeding of highly diversified varieties could provide promising resources. This study investigated the sensory and nutritional quality of nine population varieties resulting from a ten-year participatory plant-breeding process compared to two commercial pure-line varieties. Analysis of variance ...
In this article, we expand the analytical and theoretical foundations of the study of knowledge c... more In this article, we expand the analytical and theoretical foundations of the study of knowledge commons in the context of more classical agrarian commons, such as seed commons. We show that it is possible to overcome a number of criticisms of earlier work by Ostrom (Governing the commons. The evolution of institutions for collective action, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1990) on natural commons and its excludability/rivalry matrix in addressing the inclusive social practices of “commoning”, defined as a way of living and acting for the preservation of the commons. Our empirical analysis emphasizes, using the most recent advances in the IAD/SES framework, the distributed and collaborative knowledge governance in a French peasant seed network as a key driver for reintroducing cultivated agrobiodiversity and on-farm seed conservation of ancient and landrace varieties. These inclusive peasant seed groups developed alternative peer-to-peer models of collaborative peasant-led community-based breeding and grassroots innovations in the search for more resilient population varieties. Our results highlight the various models of collective action within the network and discuss the organizational tradeoffs of opting out of peasant seed activities and recreating a shared collective knowledge base on the benefits of restoring cultivated agrobiodiversity. It helps us better understand how modern peasant seed groups function as epistemic communities which contributes to envisioning alternative agricultural systems.
Abstract An in-depth analysis of the spatio-temporal evolution of crop diversity in agricultural ... more Abstract An in-depth analysis of the spatio-temporal evolution of crop diversity in agricultural landscapes is necessary to provide insights on how to improve the resilience of agroecosystems to climate instability and new pest pressures by increasing in situ crop diversity, while promoting a greater sustainability of agriculture. However, most of the indicators of crop diversity used in previous studies were based on ex situ genetic diversity, or on official lists of varieties or breeding programs, without taking acreage of the varieties actually grown in farmers’ fields into account. Acreage of varieties represent however a relevant information to assess the actual genetic vulnerability of a crop (genetic uniformity at landscape scale) cultivated in the considered regions over the period studied. To bridge this gap, we analyzed spatial varietal and genetic diversity of bread wheat in France – an important production area – over the 1980–2006 period at a yearly time step and a district scale, i.e. ‘departement’. We used HT*, an indicator integrating both the spatial evenness of variety distribution and molecular genetic data, to finely examine the spatio-temporal evolution of spatially weighted bread wheat genetic diversity. We also computed several simpler and complementary indicators accounting for the number of varieties, the spatial varietal diversity and the genetic diversity, and we estimated the individual contribution of these simpler indicators to the spatio-temporal structure of the spatial genetic diversity HT*. HT* values showed significant but non linear temporal evolutions between 1980 and 2006, these evolutions being besides spatially structured. Moreover, both spatial varietal diversity and genetic diversity partly explained these temporal changes of HT* values while the number of varieties appeared non-explanatory. Similarly to HT*, all indicators studied also showed substantial differences of temporal changes among major French agricultural regions, furthermore sometimes opposite for varietal and genetic diversity. As an example, in the north of France, varietal richness and spatial varietal diversity showed a substantial increase, suggesting the adoption of an increasing number of bread wheat varieties by farmers in this region. However, considering that genetic diversity showed a slight but continuous decrease over the recent period, this could suggest an increase in genetic similarity among bread wheat varieties chosen by farmers. Taken as a whole, our results suggest that several determinants of crop diversity, such as the shortening of crop sequences or the recurrence of epidemics of some pathogens, could differentially affect varietal choices of farmers and thus the spatial structuration of the temporal changes of crop diversity. Finally, our results question the dominant use of ex situ nationwide datasets to characterize the evolution of spatial genetic diversity as a proxy of genetic vulnerability of a crop to face with future changes.
Modern agricultural systems rely on reduced crop genetic diversity, due in particular to the use ... more Modern agricultural systems rely on reduced crop genetic diversity, due in particular to the use of homogeneous elite varieties grown in large areas. However, genetic diversity within fields is a lever for a more sustainable production, allowing greater stability and resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses. In France, a Participatory Plant Breeding (PPB) project on bread wheat, involving farmers, facilitators and researchers, has led to the development of heterogeneous populations whose within-variety genetic diversity is expected to confer the ability to adapt to farmers’ practices and environments. We studied the stability and local adaptation of ten of these farmers’ populations as well as two commercial varieties in relation to their within-variety genetic diversity. Although no clear evidence of local adaptation was detected, we found that populations’ grain yield and protein content were more stable over space and time respectively than those of commercial varieties. Moreove...
Agroecology calls for a global approach, integrating scientific, practical, and advocacy dimensio... more Agroecology calls for a global approach, integrating scientific, practical, and advocacy dimensions, to redesign agricultural systems based on ecological and socio-cultural processes and emphasizing biodiversity. This review is grounded on the results of DIVERSIFOOD, a European H2020 multi-actor research project, and explores the concept of cultivated diversity using various dimensions relevant to foster sustainable organic food systems and agro-ecological transition. From the evaluation of underutilized genetic resources and forgotten crops, DIVERSIFOOD has proposed plant breeding strategies, on-farm experimentation, and statistical tools to create new populations, landraces, and organic cultivars with intra-varietal diversity. The added value of Community Seed Banks and forms of collective seed management in Europe have been described in terms of goals and activities, and their value for improving seed regulations, treaties, and genetic resources management is discussed. In the co...
Motivation In 2005, researchers from the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food... more Motivation In 2005, researchers from the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (Institut national de recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement, INRAE) started a collaboration with the French farmers' seed network Réseau Semences Paysannes (RSP) on bread wheat participatory breeding (PPB). The aims were: (1) to study on-farm management of crop diversity; (2) to develop population-varieties adapted to organic and low inputs agriculture (3) to co-develop tools and methods adapted to on-farm experiments. In this project, researchers and farmers' organizations needed to map the history and life cycle of the population-varieties using network formalism to represent relationships between seed lots. All this information had to be centralized and stored in a database. Results We describe here SHiNeMaS (Seeds History and Network Management System) a web tool with its database. SHiNeMaS aims to provide useful interfaces to track ...
The industrialization of farming has significantly threatened cultivated biodiversity. Participat... more The industrialization of farming has significantly threatened cultivated biodiversity. Participatory breeding endeavours to overcome this issue by enabling farmers to select a wide range of crop varieties in different conditions, and to foster genetic mixing through seed exchanges, crosses or mixtures. This necessitates the design of new forms of coordination and organization for the farmers and partners involved. This article reports on an ongoing initiative, aiming to facilitate the participatory design of such forms of coordination and organization. It first outlines the method used (Knowledge–Concept–Proposals or KCP), and how it has been tailored to this highly decentralized context involving politically engaged actors on a quest for autonomy. It then presents the exploratory results of the first two workshops: these include group consolidation, the sharing of heterogeneous knowledge, the generation of innovative ideas, and the elaboration of preliminary projects. Finally, this...
Participatory plant breeding (PPB) is based on the decentralization of selection in farmers’ fiel... more Participatory plant breeding (PPB) is based on the decentralization of selection in farmers’ fields and their involvement in decision-making at all steps of the breeding scheme. Despite the evidence of its benefits to develop population varieties adapted to diversified and local practices and conditions, such as organic farming, PPB is still not widely used. There is a need to share more broadly how the different programs have overcome scientific, practical, and organizational issues and produced a large number of positive outcomes. Here, we report on a PPB program that started on bread wheat in France in 2006 and has achieved a range of outcomes, from the emergence of new organization among actors, to specific experimental designs and statistical methods developed, and to populations varieties developed and cultivated by farmers. We present the results of a two-year agronomic evaluation of the first population varieties developed within this PPB program compared to two commercial v...
As the effects of climate change begin to be felt on yield stability, it is becoming essential to... more As the effects of climate change begin to be felt on yield stability, it is becoming essential to promote the use of genetic diversity in farmers’ fields. The presence of genetic variability in variety could fulfil this purpose. Indeed, the level of intra-varietal genetic diversity influences the spatio-temporal stability of yields and the disease susceptibility of crop species. Breeding history of varieties and their management practices are two factors that should influence intra-varietal genetic diversity. This paper describes the genetic diversity of eight wheat samples covering a gradient from modern single varieties to on-farm mixtures of landraces. This gradient discriminates between landrace, historical and modern varieties, considering the breeding history of varieties, between single-varieties and mixtures of varieties, and between ex situ and in situ de facto strategy in terms of management practices. Genetic diversity of these samples was analyzed with the help of 41 sin...
Consideree comme mineure lors de la redaction de la Charte nationale des ressources genetiques en... more Consideree comme mineure lors de la redaction de la Charte nationale des ressources genetiques en 1998, la gestion a la ferme a depuis gagne en importance et en reconnaissance. En effet, apres les associations de jardiniers amateurs, des reseaux d'agriculteurs se sont federes en France autour de systemes mutualistes de selection/conservation de la diversite cultivee. Parallelement, la contribution des paysans a la gestion dynamique de l'agrobiodiversite a ete scientifiquement et institutionnellement reconnue. Ces elements nous ont conduit a examiner les complementarites dans la gestion des ressources genetiques a la ferme et en collection. Cette etude, qui croise des approches ethnobotanique et genetique, a ete menee sur le ble tendre pour lequel il existe en France une collection nationale de 10 000 accessions et un reseau actif d'agriculteurs-collectionneurs de varietes. Pour la variete Rouge de Bordeaux, nous avons tente de caracteriser la diversite dans les champs et...
De nombreuses etudes realisees sur les systemes d'agriculture traditionnelle ont montre que l... more De nombreuses etudes realisees sur les systemes d'agriculture traditionnelle ont montre que les pratiques paysannes de gestion des especes cultivees constituaient la cle de l’adaptation locale tout en permettant de conserver la diversite genetique, grâce a la coexistence de l'ensemble des processus evolutifs. Quelle diversite initiale est la plus appropriee pour cette gestion dynamique, et quelles modalites de gestion peut‐on recommander pour la preservation du potentiel evolutif de ces populations et de la diversite genetique a l'echelle globale ? Nous nous posons ces questions dans le contexte de l'agriculture francaise : en collaboration avec des paysans en agriculture biologique, nous evaluant dans des varietes de ble de pays les effets de la selection naturelle et de la selection dirigee par les paysans sur l'adaptation et la diversite phenotypique et genetique. En etablissant des liens entre chercheurs et paysans, le projet vise a developper des methodes de...
Mixed cropping is the simultaneous cultivation of different crop species in the same field at the... more Mixed cropping is the simultaneous cultivation of different crop species in the same field at the same time. Especially combina-tions of legume with non-legume plants provide agronomic advan-tages, such as increased productivity and higher yield stability under low-inputs conditions. In mixed cropping, choosing the right cultivars is crucial for the performance of the crop, as shown for e.g. maize with bean by Hoppe (2016). As performance in pure stand can strongly diverge from performance in mixture, estimating the ability of a cultivar to be mixed with another crop is therefore of utmost importance. For this purpose, concepts of general and specific combining abili-ty from hybrid breeding have been adapted to cultivar and crop mixtures. Thus, these effects are called general mixing ability (GMA) and specific mixing ability (SMA). The harvest of most inter-specific mixtures can be separated due to different grain sizes. This fact allows to access valuable information about competit...
Wheat is a staple food in many diets and is currently cultivated worldwide. It provides a large p... more Wheat is a staple food in many diets and is currently cultivated worldwide. It provides a large proportion of the daily energy intake and contributes to food balance. Changes in agro-industrial practices in the bread sector, from the field to bread-making, have led to an increase in chronic diseases and nutritional deficits, emphasizing the link between food and health. Several levers could be used to improve the nutritional quality of bread wheat. Organic farming, by avoiding the use of pesticides, might allow for greater consumption of wholegrain products. Breeding wheat cultivars with an enhanced mineral content may serve as another lever. In this context, the on-farm participatory plant-breeding of highly diversified varieties could provide promising resources. This study investigated the sensory and nutritional quality of nine population varieties resulting from a ten-year participatory plant-breeding process compared to two commercial pure-line varieties. Analysis of variance ...
In this article, we expand the analytical and theoretical foundations of the study of knowledge c... more In this article, we expand the analytical and theoretical foundations of the study of knowledge commons in the context of more classical agrarian commons, such as seed commons. We show that it is possible to overcome a number of criticisms of earlier work by Ostrom (Governing the commons. The evolution of institutions for collective action, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1990) on natural commons and its excludability/rivalry matrix in addressing the inclusive social practices of “commoning”, defined as a way of living and acting for the preservation of the commons. Our empirical analysis emphasizes, using the most recent advances in the IAD/SES framework, the distributed and collaborative knowledge governance in a French peasant seed network as a key driver for reintroducing cultivated agrobiodiversity and on-farm seed conservation of ancient and landrace varieties. These inclusive peasant seed groups developed alternative peer-to-peer models of collaborative peasant-led community-based breeding and grassroots innovations in the search for more resilient population varieties. Our results highlight the various models of collective action within the network and discuss the organizational tradeoffs of opting out of peasant seed activities and recreating a shared collective knowledge base on the benefits of restoring cultivated agrobiodiversity. It helps us better understand how modern peasant seed groups function as epistemic communities which contributes to envisioning alternative agricultural systems.
Abstract An in-depth analysis of the spatio-temporal evolution of crop diversity in agricultural ... more Abstract An in-depth analysis of the spatio-temporal evolution of crop diversity in agricultural landscapes is necessary to provide insights on how to improve the resilience of agroecosystems to climate instability and new pest pressures by increasing in situ crop diversity, while promoting a greater sustainability of agriculture. However, most of the indicators of crop diversity used in previous studies were based on ex situ genetic diversity, or on official lists of varieties or breeding programs, without taking acreage of the varieties actually grown in farmers’ fields into account. Acreage of varieties represent however a relevant information to assess the actual genetic vulnerability of a crop (genetic uniformity at landscape scale) cultivated in the considered regions over the period studied. To bridge this gap, we analyzed spatial varietal and genetic diversity of bread wheat in France – an important production area – over the 1980–2006 period at a yearly time step and a district scale, i.e. ‘departement’. We used HT*, an indicator integrating both the spatial evenness of variety distribution and molecular genetic data, to finely examine the spatio-temporal evolution of spatially weighted bread wheat genetic diversity. We also computed several simpler and complementary indicators accounting for the number of varieties, the spatial varietal diversity and the genetic diversity, and we estimated the individual contribution of these simpler indicators to the spatio-temporal structure of the spatial genetic diversity HT*. HT* values showed significant but non linear temporal evolutions between 1980 and 2006, these evolutions being besides spatially structured. Moreover, both spatial varietal diversity and genetic diversity partly explained these temporal changes of HT* values while the number of varieties appeared non-explanatory. Similarly to HT*, all indicators studied also showed substantial differences of temporal changes among major French agricultural regions, furthermore sometimes opposite for varietal and genetic diversity. As an example, in the north of France, varietal richness and spatial varietal diversity showed a substantial increase, suggesting the adoption of an increasing number of bread wheat varieties by farmers in this region. However, considering that genetic diversity showed a slight but continuous decrease over the recent period, this could suggest an increase in genetic similarity among bread wheat varieties chosen by farmers. Taken as a whole, our results suggest that several determinants of crop diversity, such as the shortening of crop sequences or the recurrence of epidemics of some pathogens, could differentially affect varietal choices of farmers and thus the spatial structuration of the temporal changes of crop diversity. Finally, our results question the dominant use of ex situ nationwide datasets to characterize the evolution of spatial genetic diversity as a proxy of genetic vulnerability of a crop to face with future changes.
Modern agricultural systems rely on reduced crop genetic diversity, due in particular to the use ... more Modern agricultural systems rely on reduced crop genetic diversity, due in particular to the use of homogeneous elite varieties grown in large areas. However, genetic diversity within fields is a lever for a more sustainable production, allowing greater stability and resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses. In France, a Participatory Plant Breeding (PPB) project on bread wheat, involving farmers, facilitators and researchers, has led to the development of heterogeneous populations whose within-variety genetic diversity is expected to confer the ability to adapt to farmers’ practices and environments. We studied the stability and local adaptation of ten of these farmers’ populations as well as two commercial varieties in relation to their within-variety genetic diversity. Although no clear evidence of local adaptation was detected, we found that populations’ grain yield and protein content were more stable over space and time respectively than those of commercial varieties. Moreove...
Agroecology calls for a global approach, integrating scientific, practical, and advocacy dimensio... more Agroecology calls for a global approach, integrating scientific, practical, and advocacy dimensions, to redesign agricultural systems based on ecological and socio-cultural processes and emphasizing biodiversity. This review is grounded on the results of DIVERSIFOOD, a European H2020 multi-actor research project, and explores the concept of cultivated diversity using various dimensions relevant to foster sustainable organic food systems and agro-ecological transition. From the evaluation of underutilized genetic resources and forgotten crops, DIVERSIFOOD has proposed plant breeding strategies, on-farm experimentation, and statistical tools to create new populations, landraces, and organic cultivars with intra-varietal diversity. The added value of Community Seed Banks and forms of collective seed management in Europe have been described in terms of goals and activities, and their value for improving seed regulations, treaties, and genetic resources management is discussed. In the co...
Motivation In 2005, researchers from the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food... more Motivation In 2005, researchers from the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (Institut national de recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement, INRAE) started a collaboration with the French farmers' seed network Réseau Semences Paysannes (RSP) on bread wheat participatory breeding (PPB). The aims were: (1) to study on-farm management of crop diversity; (2) to develop population-varieties adapted to organic and low inputs agriculture (3) to co-develop tools and methods adapted to on-farm experiments. In this project, researchers and farmers' organizations needed to map the history and life cycle of the population-varieties using network formalism to represent relationships between seed lots. All this information had to be centralized and stored in a database. Results We describe here SHiNeMaS (Seeds History and Network Management System) a web tool with its database. SHiNeMaS aims to provide useful interfaces to track ...
The industrialization of farming has significantly threatened cultivated biodiversity. Participat... more The industrialization of farming has significantly threatened cultivated biodiversity. Participatory breeding endeavours to overcome this issue by enabling farmers to select a wide range of crop varieties in different conditions, and to foster genetic mixing through seed exchanges, crosses or mixtures. This necessitates the design of new forms of coordination and organization for the farmers and partners involved. This article reports on an ongoing initiative, aiming to facilitate the participatory design of such forms of coordination and organization. It first outlines the method used (Knowledge–Concept–Proposals or KCP), and how it has been tailored to this highly decentralized context involving politically engaged actors on a quest for autonomy. It then presents the exploratory results of the first two workshops: these include group consolidation, the sharing of heterogeneous knowledge, the generation of innovative ideas, and the elaboration of preliminary projects. Finally, this...
Participatory plant breeding (PPB) is based on the decentralization of selection in farmers’ fiel... more Participatory plant breeding (PPB) is based on the decentralization of selection in farmers’ fields and their involvement in decision-making at all steps of the breeding scheme. Despite the evidence of its benefits to develop population varieties adapted to diversified and local practices and conditions, such as organic farming, PPB is still not widely used. There is a need to share more broadly how the different programs have overcome scientific, practical, and organizational issues and produced a large number of positive outcomes. Here, we report on a PPB program that started on bread wheat in France in 2006 and has achieved a range of outcomes, from the emergence of new organization among actors, to specific experimental designs and statistical methods developed, and to populations varieties developed and cultivated by farmers. We present the results of a two-year agronomic evaluation of the first population varieties developed within this PPB program compared to two commercial v...
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Papers by Isabelle Goldringer