Webinar Innovation Mission Climate Smart Agriculture India
This week RVO and the Netherlands Embassy in India organized the first in a series of webinars as part of a Climate Smart Agriculture innovation mission in India.
Background
The Netherlands and India are working together to address shared societal challenges in the field of climate smart agriculture. Research funding has been made available by the Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India as well as the Netherlands Research Organization and a mission is scheduled to come to India in September (subject to the COVID-19 situation). The webinars encourage thought exchange and partnership formation during these uncertain times.
Plant breeding for climate smart agriculture
Climate change is predicted to lead to declines in crop yields by the 2030s varying from 10 to 50%, as both abiotic (for example drought, floods, high temperatures) and biotic (pests and diseases) stressors increase. Breeders and researchers are looking for plant traits such as drought and disease tolerance; and affordable technologies to speed up breeding such as molecular markers and gene identification. In this way, plant breeding innovation contributes to providing sufficient and healthy food to a growing world population.
Webinar
Experts from Wageningen University, AcsenHyVeg, Syngenta, RijkZwaan, Nunhems and ICRISAT discussed state of the art and future directions in plant breeding. 150+ participants shared their questions and made the session interactive. Want to know what you missed? The recording of the session can be viewed here.
We’re looking forward to continuing these discussions and advancing Indian and Dutch collaboration in #agrifood.
