Bioversity International

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Bioversity International An overview
Emile A. Frison, Director General SLU, Uppsala,
23 September 2008
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Mission

• Bioversity undertakes, encourages and supports
  research and other activities on the use and
  conservation of agricultural biodiversity,
  especially genetic resources, to create more
  productive, resilient and sustainable harvests.
  Diversity for Well-being Making the most of
  agricultural biodiversity

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• Bioversity works with a global range of partners
  to maximize impact, to develop capacity and to
  ensure that all stakeholders have a voice.

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How we work

• No laboratories or field sites
• Research with partners (NARIs, NGOs, IGOs,
  Universities, local communities and others)
• Also a catalyst, coordinator, facilitator,
  consensus broker, think tank
• Interact with networks (COGENT, MusaNet, CacaoNet
  and others)

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Where we work
A staff of over 300 operating from over 20
locations around the world
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Diversity for Well-Being

• Focus on people
• From plant genetic resources to agricultural
  biodiversity
• Commodity based production systems (banana,
  coconut, cacao)
• Policy and public awareness

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Focus Areas

• Managing agricultural biodiversity for better
  nutrition, improved livelihoods, and more
  sustainable production systems for the poor
• Conserving and promoting the use of biodiversity
  in selected commodity crops of special importance
  to the poor
• Enhancing the ex situ conservation and use of
  diversity

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Focus Areas

• Conservation and sustainable use of forest and
  other wild species
• International collaboration on conservation and
  use of agricultural biodiversity
• Status, trends and valuation of agricultural
  biodiversity

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Focus Areas

• Managing agricultural biodiversity for better
  nutrition, improved livelihoods, and more
  sustainable production systems for the poor
• Conserving and promoting the use of biodiversity
  in selected commodity crops of special importance
  to the poor
• Enhancing the ex situ conservation and use of
  diversity

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Demonstrating

• Resilience and sustainability
• Adaptation to climate change
• Control pests diseases
• Ecosystem services
• Nutrition and health
• Cultural role

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Hidden hunger

• Hidden hunger
• missing micronutrients
• Affects at least 2 billion worldwide
• Mostly women and children

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Double burden

• Diseases of affluence
• increasing
• Type 2 diabetes,
• Obesity,
• Cardio-vascular diseases
• Cancers

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Benefits of Diverse Diets

• Diverse diets are robust
• Better nutrition
• Better health
• Fight infectious diseases TB, malaria
• Transcend generations

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Focus Areas

• Managing agricultural biodiversity for better
  nutrition, improved livelihoods, and more
  sustainable production systems for the poor
• Conserving and promoting the use of biodiversity
  in selected commodity crops of special importance
  to the poor
• Enhancing the ex situ conservation and use of
  diversity

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Bioversity pro-poor commodity crop research
agenda

• based on helping smallholders and their
  communities to derive maximum benefit from
  effective management of biodiversity of their
  crops and in their production systems

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Banana, coconut and cacao

• Worlds largest banana collection
• Banana improvement
• Using coconut diversity
• Farmer participatory cacao improvement
• Markets and livelihoods
• Challenge of banana and coconut diseases

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Focus Areas

• Managing agricultural biodiversity for better
  nutrition, improved livelihoods, and more
  sustainable production systems for the poor
• Conserving and promoting the use of biodiversity
  in selected commodity crops of special importance
  to the poor
• Enhancing the ex situ conservation and use of
  diversity

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Ex situ conservation use

• Cryopreservation
• Low cost conservation technologies
• Facilitate use of diversity
• Information
• Characterization and trait identification

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Focus Areas

• Conservation and sustainable use of forest and
  other wild species
• International collaboration on conservation and
  use of agricultural biodiversity
• Status, trends and valuation of agricultural
  biodiversity

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Safeguarding wild diversity

• Wild relatives of crops including fruit and nut
  trees
• Forest and other species harvested from the wild
• 10 of worlds trees estimated threatened with
  extinction
• role of forest genetic diversity in improving the
  adaptability of forests to climate change
• potential conservation of within-species
  diversity largely ignored

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Complementary approaches to conservation
and backup ex situ -- a challenge for tropical
trees
in the wild
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Wild relatives of crop species

• Principal sources of resistance to biotic,
  abiotic stresses
• through exchange of pollen and deliberate
  breeding
• increasingly important for adaptation to climate
  change
• Threatened
• by habitat loss degradation
• by climate change
• Little information available on their
  distribution, status, characteristics
• Current Protected Area networks dont address
  them
• but in-situ conservation is necessary to ensure
  their continuing evolution in response to
  selective pressures

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Climate change projected to reduce habitat,
threatening extinction of many wild species
Arachis (peanut) 2055 89 reduction
Arachis (peanut) 2005
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Participatory research to promote in situ
conservation in 5 biodiversity hotspots

• Armenia, Bolivia, Madagascar, Sri Lanka,
  Uzbekistan
• Centres of diversity for wheat, potato, coffee,
  cacao, black pepper, cinnamon, banana, apple,
  walnut and pistachio
• 35 genera of wild relatives prioritized
• Red list evaluations in process
• Ecogeographic surveys to evaluate distributions,
  infra-specific diversity, variation, ecological
  conditions
• Wild relatives hotspots will be used to select
  priority areas
• One representative protected area/country will be
  established
• and management guidelines developed
• with participation of local communities
• Capacity development through training
• Red List evaluation, GIS tools, Ecogeographic
  Surveys, Information systems management
• Raising awareness
• Developing approaches for broader application

with UNEP/GEFBGCI BLE FAO IUCN UNEP-WCMC
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Focus Areas

• Conservation and sustainable use of forest and
  other wild species
• International collaboration on conservation and
  use of agricultural biodiversity
• Status, trends and valuation of agricultural
  biodiversity

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Towards a global conservation system

• Policy options the Treaty
• Information systems
• SINGER
• Global accession-level information system
• Putting agricultural biodiversity on the global
  agenda CBD, WHO, COHAB, WIPO, UNESCO
• Public awareness

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Focus Areas

• Conservation and sustainable use of forest and
  other wild species
• International collaboration on conservation and
  use of agricultural biodiversity
• Status, trends and valuation of agricultural
  biodiversity

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Status, trends and valuation

• Development of indicators for agrobiodiversity
• Valuation methodologies

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Meeting the Millennium Development Goals

• Agricultural biodiversity to
• Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger (MDG 1)
• Reduce child mortality (MDG 4)
• Improve maternal health (MDG 5)
• Ensure environmental sustainability (MDG 7)

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Thank you
For more information www.bioversityinternational
.org