The project “Use of crop wild relatives to develop drought tolerant alfalfa and its extension to subsistence farmers in Kazakhstan, China and Chile” is being carried out by the Grassland Research Institute Residents’ Committee Community Health Service Station (GRI/ CAAS), National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Kazakhstan (KSRIAPG), the Institución de Investigación Agropecuaria de Chile (INIA, Chile), and University of California, Davis. The project will take place between 2019 and 2020.
The wild alfalfa (lucerne) project sourced and acquired drought tolerant germplasm and developed hybrids for use in plant breeding programs by introgressing this germplasm into modern plant varieties. The next stage of the project will see further development and expanded evaluation of these hybrids in new environments in Kazakhstan, China, Chile and Australia. The hybrids created in this project will also be promoted to plant breeders around the world, with seed made freely available through a SMTA.
This pre-breeding work will focus on eight different crop wild relatives of alfalfa: Medicago sativa subsp. sativa Medicago sativa subsp. falcata, Medicago sativa subsp. caerulea, Medicago sativa subsp. glomerata, Medicago arborea, Medicago strasseri, Medicago ruthenica, Medicago truncatula.
