John Spellar
Shadow Minister (Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs)
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what programmes to develop drought-resistant or tolerant crops are being funded by her Department.
James Paice
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
DEFRA funds research on the impact of water shortages on farming through the Farming and Food Science Sustainable Water Management R and D programme, which includes research and development to develop crop varieties with improved water-use efficiency. These projects are shown in the following table.
DEFRA also funds broader Crop Genetic Improvement Networks (on cereals, oilseed rape, pulses, vegetables, grasses, biomass crops) which deliver tools and knowledge to underpin plant breeding and the development of varieties with improved performance such as efficient use of water and nutrients.
| Project code | End date | Title |
| AC0314 | 30 April 2013 | Identification of important crop traits for adaptation to climate change |
| HL0187LFV | 31 March 2012 | Improving water use efficiency and fruit quality in field grown strawberry |
| WU0106 | 30 June 2011 | Generic approaches to increasing water use efficiency (WUE) in crops by enhancing abscisic acid biosynthesis |
| WU0107 | 31 March 2012 | Determination of the response of strawberry to water-limited conditions, identification of quantitative trait loci (QTL) and development of molecular markers |
| WU0115 | 31 March 2014 | Genomics tools for pre-selection of water-use efficiency in top fruit rootstocks |
| WU0121 | 31 March 2012 | An Integrated Approach to Increasing Water Use Efficiency and Drought Tolerance of Wheat Production in UK |
| IF0145 | 31 March 2013 | Understanding and dissecting the genetic control of key “environmental impact” traits in forage grasses and legumes |
| LK0688 | 31 March 2013 | Development of productive and persistent high quality forage grasses and white clover with increased water-use-efficiency and resilience to summer droughts |
| IF0142 | 30 September 2011 | Sequencing the gene space of potato chromosome IV, comparative analysis with tomato and development of a gene based mapping platform (contribution to a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council project-funding of SCRI component) |
| IF0157 | 31 March 2012 | Leafy Vegetable Genetic Improvement Network (VeGIN 1): Pre-breeding research to support sustainable farming of leafy vegetables and salads |
| IFO158 | 31 March 2012 | Vegetable Genetic Improvement Network (VeGIN 2): Pre-breeding research to support sustainable farming of carrot and onion |
| IF0146 | 30 November 2013 | The Wheat Genetic Improvement Network (WGIN) - Improving the environmental footprint of farming through crop genetics and targeted traits analysis |
| IF0147 | 31 January 2014 | DEFRA Pulse Crop Genetic Improvement Network |
| IF0144 | 31 March 2013 | OREGIN - Pre-breeding research to support climate change adaptation and reduction of the environmental footprint of oilseed rape |
| LK09129 | 15 September 2014 | Exploiting novel genes to improve resource use efficiency in wheat |
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