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Introduction

Overall objective

The overall objective of the proposed action is the establishment of a network of partners active in the conservation and utilisation of Plant Genetic Resources (PGR) of the leafy vegetables most important for Europe: lettuce (Lactuca spp.), spinach (Spinacia spp.) and chicory (Cichorium spp.), and also increasingly important minor crops like lamb’s lettuce (Valerianella locusta) and rucola (Eruca sativa and Diplotaxis spp.).

Specific objectives

During the four-year period the major objectives of the proposed action will be:

Actions and means involved

To meet the objectives of the Leafy Veg project a consortium of fourteen European partners was established which covers all the necessary knowledge to make this project a success. Five workpackages have been developed: Documentation, Characterization & Regeneration, Evaluation, Utilization & Marketing and Coordination. The mean emphasis in the project is on the WPs Characterization & Regeneration and Evaluation as in total 1200 (C&R) and 1000 (E) accessions will be screened. From a budget point of view 39% and 28% will be invested in C&R and E activities. The total budget of the Leafy Veg project will amount to 1.2 M€. This major investment in EU leafy vegetable genetic resources will result in the upgrading of the EU leafy vegetable databases and will allow for a considerably improved utilization of these collections by breeders and also by NGOs active in the area of promoting regionally produced products. Furthermore the improved databases will allow us to analyse where gaps in the collections still exist. Also it will allow the EU leafy vegetable genebanks to safeguard in a better way there collections via the improvement of their safety duplications.

State-of-the-art of the genetic resources of leafy vegetable crops in Europe and actions to enhance them

Leafy vegetables network
Although several PGR vegetable groups were established under the flag of the ECP/GR network, it took until 2000 for the ECP/GR Vegetables Network Co-ordinating Group Meeting to discuss the establishment of an ad hoc Leafy Vegetables group. During that meeting a review paper of Lebeda and Boukema (2001) was discussed presenting the state on PGR of leafy vegetables in Europe. In May 2003 at an ECP/GR Vegetables Network Meeting in Poland this ad hoc Leafy Vegetables group discussed future co-operation (Lebeda and Boukema, 2005). The meeting decided to apply for working group status under the ECP/GR Vegetables Network. This was granted at the end of 2003. The Leafy Vegetables group reviewed during that meeting also the situation on databases, regeneration, characterisation, regeneration protocols and safety duplication of the leafy vegetables. The group also agreed the minimum descriptors for lettuce, spinach and Cichorium. As a result of the meeting the group decided to submit a proposal in the new Council Regulation (EC) N0 870/2004 in order to speed up the outlined activities to further develop the European Co-operation on PGR of leafy vegetables.
Leafy vegetables databases
The necessity of a database for lettuce, the most important leafy vegetable became apparent during the "Eucarpia Leafy Vegetable Meeting", June 1999 at Olomouc, Czech Republic. There it was shown that Lactuca is relatively well represented in genebanks, but that access to information on lettuce collections is not optimal and duplication between Lactuca collections is considerable (van Hintum and Boukema, 1999). The database was developed and a first version was placed on the Internet in July 2000. There are however, no databases for the other leafy vegetable crops and consequently this will be an important activity of this project.
Leafy vegetables collections
The genebanks and other collection holders participating in this proposal, maintain the majority of the European leafy vegetable collections (Table 1). The table also indicates that there is a need for further computerisation of the collections of spinach, chicory and minor leafy vegetables. The International Lactuca database (ILDB) includes 8980 accessions (Stavelikova et al, 2002) from Europe and the USA and table 1 shows that the holdings of the project members comprise a substantial part of the ILDB and EURISCO. The conclusion of the present investigation is that there is a need to establish crop databases of spinach, chicory and minor leafy vegetables and further updating of the ILDB.

In the past only parts of the collections have been characterised and evaluated. Evaluation of lettuce accessions was given high priority in the past, therefore the project will also focus on the evaluation for important properties of some of the other crops. Regeneration is a permanent task of genebanks and the partners indicated that approximately 30% of the holdings require regeneration in the near future.

The European lettuce collections include cultivated lettuce (Lactuca sativa) and wild related Lactuca species (ca. 15%). The cultivated lettuce consists of different types like butter-head, batavia, crisp (e.g. iceberg types), cos, latin and cutting lettuce (including lollo and oakleaf types). Within these different types a broad diversity exists with regard to leaf shapes and colours. There are types more suitable for field production and others for glasshouse cultivation. The wild related species include the species Lactuca serriola widely used in breeding and the lesser used L. virosa and L. saligna. A number of other more distant species are limited in their representation in the collections. The European spinach collections include only very few wild species. The morphological diversity is far less than in lettuce. There are also types for field and glasshouse cultivation. The genus Cichorium belongs like lettuce to the family Asteraceae and comprises about 10 species. Most chicory collections include the two cultivated species: C. intybus and C. endivia. These species contain many subtypes representing an important source of genetic diversity, potentially able to create new subtypes, or to introduce interesting agronomic characters, like disease resistance. C. intybus contains three main groups: first the ‘Witloof chicories’ which are forced to obtain a chicon and cultivated in Belgium, the North of France and the Netherlands. Old populations of this group are under severe threat of genetic erosion and need conservation and regeneration. The second group, the leaf chicories, has a high diversity for shapes and colours, for uses (as salad or cooked) and for the consumed organs (leaves, stem and roots) in Italy. In Northern Europe there are only forcing types. The third group, root chicories for industrial use, is not included in this project. Wild C. intybus is also represented in collections but in low numbers. C. endivia (endive) contains two types, those without leaf incisions and those with extreme leaf incisions. The rather small collections of the minor leafy vegetable crops lamb’s lettuce (Valerianella locusta) and rucola (Eruca sativa and Diplotaxis spp) are not very variable. These species have been neglected in the past and need to receive more attention now. Neglected and underutilized crops contribute to agricultural diversification and safeguarding the agrobiodiversity heritage of certain regions. In addition they may provide additional sources of income to farmers (Padulosi, 1999).

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Annual update

The Leafy Veg partners together at their start-up meeting in Wageningen, Netherlands

Highlights of the first Leafy Veg project year (2007)

The Leafy Vegetable project is a EU funded project which aims at the improvement of the leafy vegetable collections present in European genebanks. To this end a consortium of thirteen partners was formed for a period of four years. The consortium exists of genebanks, research institutes, universities and breeding companies. In the first project year (2007) a number of activities started. A leafy vegetables database was constructed and data of 11536 lettuce, 1830 spinach, 1180 chicory and 216 accessions of minor leafy vegetables were collected and included in the database. Regeneration (seed production) and characterization activities also took place in the first project year and around 40% of the accessions involved in this project were regenerated and characterized by the partners.
Evaluation of the accessions was only started for lettuce and involved post harvest discolouration. Identification of accessions with unique selling point qualities for use in marketing activities was started.
For an efficient communication between the partners and between the partnership and society a Leafy Vegetable website was developed (http://documents.plant.wur.nl/cgn/pgr/leafyveg/). Furthermore ample PR activities took place resulting in five professional, eleven newspaper and nine web publications (see also Leafy Veg in the spotlight!). Last but not least the partners met twice during the first project year, namely at the start-up meeting in Wageningen (the Netherlands) and the first annual meeting in Angers (France).

Project partners present at the second annual meeting at NordGen (Alnarp, Sweden) Highlights of the second project year (2008)

The development of the crop databases for spinach, Cichorium and minor leafy vegetables was finished and were made on-line available. Furthermore the international Lactuca database was updated. Project data were made available as downloadable files in the databases. A total of six characterization data files and five evaluation data files are currently included.
The status overview concerning safety duplication of the leafy vegetables collections of partners reached near completion in 2008. Two partners started with the actual arrangement of safety duplication in 2008.
In total 65% of all accessions involved in the project have been regenerated (62%) and/or characterized (68%) within the first two years of the project. All partners have initiated their evaluation processes according to the initial program, except chicory evaluation for sesquiterpenes components, which was postponed to 2009 and 2010. Both for pest/disease resistance and quality/abiotic characters, the 2008 evaluation targeted 83 % of the aim for lettuce, 99 % for spinach, 20 % for chicory and 136 % for minor crops.
Accessions for evaluation for utilisation and marketing were identified. Some activities (assessment of chicory) commenced earlier than planned. So far no accessions were identified which had significant enough unique selling point for use in marketing activities. One general meeting held at NordGen (Alnarp, Sweden) and one WP leader meeting held at Arche Noah (Schiltern, Austria) was organized; a project website was maintained and e-reports were produced in order to increase the flow of information between the partners. Furthermore a number of professional publications were written to promote the project.

 

 

 

Leafy Veg in the news

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Comments and questions to: Chris Kik.