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GCP Phase II: Focus on selected, crops, trait-crop combinations and farming systems
Following an extensive External Programme and Management Review (EPMR) in late 2007, the Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) now focuses on seven trait–crop combinations. The EPMR panel recommended that half of GCP’s resources be devoted to these seven trait–crop combinations, now dubbed ‘Challenge Initiatives’.
GCP continues to work on 12 target crops and associated farming systems, and—overall—on 18 mandate crops.
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GCP Challenge initiatives
Collaborators looking for information specific to their own Challenge Initiative (CI) should visit the restricted-access CI homepage
Listed below are the seven Challenge Initiatives, with their respective Product Delivery Coordinators (PDCs) indicated in brackets:
Cereals
1. Improving drought tolerance in rice for Africa (CI4; PDC: Nourollah Ahmadi, CIRAD)
2. Improving drought tolerance in wheat for Asia (CI6; PDC: Richard Trethowan, Plant Breeding Institute, University of Sydney, Australia)
3. Improving drought tolerance in sorghum for Africa (CI5; PDC: Oumar Niangado, Syngenta Foundation)
4. Comparative genomics to improve cereal yields in high-aluminium and low-phosphorous soils (CI7; PDC: Leon Kochian, USDA–ARS, USA)
Legumes
5. Improving drought tolerance in cowpeas for Africa (CI3; PDC: Jeff Ehlers, University of California–Riverside, USA)
6. Improving drought tolerance in chickpeas for Africa and Asia (CI2; PDC: Pooran Gaur, ICRISAT)
Root and tubers
7. Improving cassava yield in Africa's drought-prone environments (CI1; PDC: Emmanuel Okogbenin, National Root Crops Research Institute, Nigeria)
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GCP target crops and farming systems
In 2006, Generation Challenge Programme scientists developed and applied a new method for identifying areas where poverty and drought-prone crop production coincide. This analysis of global spatial datasets identified five farming systems in South Asia, five in sub-Saharan Africa, four in East Asia, and one in Mesoamerica where drought coincides with high levels of poverty.
The study also sought to find out which crops poor farmers rely on the most by examining a global database of harvested area and production. This analysis identified 12 crops as covering at least 5 percent of the cultivated area of each of the 15 farming systems stricken most by poverty and drought.
As GCP enters its second phase (2009-2013), the programme will seek to focus on these 12 crops, listed below (in alphabetical order):
| 1. barley |
4. chickpeas |
7. maize |
10. sorghum |
| 2. beans |
5. cowpeas |
8. millet |
11. sweet potatoes |
| 3. cassava |
6. groundnuts |
9. rice |
12. wheat |
Learn more about the GCP target farming systems
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GCP mandate crops
Below are GCP's mandate crops, presented in alphabetical order:
| 1. barley |
5. cowpeas |
9. millets |
13. potatoes |
17. wheat |
| 2. cassava |
6. groundnuts |
10. Musa |
14. rice |
18. yams |
| 3. chickpeas |
7. lentils |
11. Phaseolus |
15. sorghum |
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| 4. coconuts |
8. maize |
12. pigeonpeas |
16. sweet potatoes |
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