BRINGING OLIVE

GENETIC RESOURCES CLOSER

TO BREEDERS AND GROWERS

WHAT WE DO

GEN4OLIVE is an EU-funded Innovation Action that aims at increasing olive GenRes mobilisation and encouraging pre-breeding activities.

> THE CHALLENGE ///

Climate change and emerging diseases threaten olive production. Genetic erosion means a high risk since only a 5 % of olive varieties present in the worldwide harvested area are commercially-exploited. Olive genetic resources (GenRes) could offer a solution, but these remain unexploited due to the limited development of pre-breeding activities and the lack of collaboration between germplasm banks and farmers/breeders.

95%

Olive varieties

Remains untapped and unutilised and are only preserved in Germplasm Banks. The real genetic erosion lies here! These varieties can lie dormant if no triggered by specific actions that help them become active, explorable and transferable to the end users. GEN4OLIVE will help overcome this problem.

> EXPECTED IMPACTS ///

ECONOMIC, SOCIAL & ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

· Untap new business opportunities (20 potential business ideas).

· Respond to consumers’ new demands related to healthier and functional foods (15 pre-breeding projects or breeding plans related to consumers’ needs).

· Provide evidence-based recommendations in support of genetic resources conservation and management for policy-makers (Best practices and recommendations).

· Obtention of new resistant olive varieties to different pest and diseases (significant reduction – up to zero – of chemical inputs in olive growing).

· Avoid the genetic erosion risk of the wild resources (organisation, exploration and conservation of wild and ancient olive GenRes).

SCIENTIFIC IMPACT

· Development of harmonised protocols for enhancing coordination among Olive Germplasm Banks (over 15 protocols).

· Provide selected olive progenitors for new breeding lines (6 per topic).

· Bridge the gap between Germplasm Banks and end-users (over 40 SMEs beneficiaries, 10 pre-breeding projects and 20 breeding plans).

· Encourage the connection between leading researchers and Germplasm Banks/end-users (Advisory Board with 10 members).

· Patent applications in the area (2 patents applications).

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