b'INTERNATIONAL AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENTPassing the Plant Breeding TorchIF YOU HAVEbeen reading my columns, you mayIn the meantime, I had been pondering about the have heard me talking quite a lot about COVID-19question of how to encourage more students to take upbut you might not know anything about my back- plant breeding. The generation of plant breeders that ground! So, I thought wed take a break from all thewas created during the green revolution were retiring, COVID talk for me to tell you a bit more about myselfand I was worried that their vast knowledge would be and what I do.lost as there wasnt the next generation to take it on. I My interest in agriculture began youngI grewremember going to a talk from Cary Fowler, the founder up on a dairy farm in one of the southern states ofof the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, on preserving the Australia. From there, I went to study agriculture atworlds germplasm. I asked him if he could keep 1/3 of university, which was where I found my passion in plantits space for me and he questioned me why? I told him ANTHONY LEDDINbreeding.that in Australia there is only 1/3 of the plant breeders Inspired afterI like to think the mystery in life is to do something asof what we had 30 years ago, so I needed to freeze the reading Thea job that you were born to do. For me that was plantones that we had left so that they would be around Coming Famine,breeding.when the breeding work on seed was needed.this AustralianI also had a passion in overseas aid work. GrowingSometimes we look at segments of problems and plant breeder setup in Australia, I was lucky enough that everythingnot the whole picture. It was from there I though of the out to make acame easy to me. I always feltafter growing up soconcept of Plant Breeders Without Borders (PBWOB). difference. Planteasilythat I owed something back to my global com- It was a molding together of my two passions in life, Breeders Withoutmunity, so I tried to repay it with overseas volunteerplant breeding and overseas aid work. The idea was Borders encourageswork. After I came back from a year teaching agricul- to get plant breeders to volunteer their time to work plant breeders andture in Samoa, I began my postgrad studies to becomein developing countries teaching smallholder farmers students to volunteera plant breeder. about how to develop their own varieties of underu-their time for inter- In my studies, I realized was the skill of plant breed- tilized crops. Underutilized crops are plants that have national breedinging was a dying art. In my plant breeding lectures athad minimal research and plant breeding done on projects. university, there was only 5 students total. The yearthem in that environment. These underutilized crops after I graduated, the class was stopped due to lackare important to the local people but there are no seed of interest. One of the only things students hear aboutcompanies working on them so PBWOB is not stifling plant breeding these days is about GMO and molecu- the development of a seed industry within the country. lar techniques that are performed in the laboratory.In a way it is promoting the locals to start their own Students dont really think of plant breeding as beingseed businesses with that crop as they own the varie-and exciting job.ties that are developed from the program. The projects After I finished my studies, I looked for jobs inalso have a student component. Local students come pasture breeding, which was the focus of my masters.along to the training as well as a student from western In Australia, there were no opportunities as publiccountries so they can see how much of an adventure breeding programs were closing down and most of theplant breeding can be. pasture varieties in Australia were being bred overseas.So, after 15 years of getting the idea started This didnt daunt me, because if you look at the climatePBWOB has got a Bayer as a sponsor and has com-change predictions it showed that Australia was goingpleted three projects in Ethiopia, Indonesia and Nepal through more rapid drying and heating than where ourwith another four projects planned once things return pasture varieties were coming from. I knew I just hadto normal after COVID-19. Hopefully the idea will stimu-to wait it out till companies realized these trends. Thatlate the development of new plant breeders around company was Valley Seeds and 12 years ago I startedthe world that will create the new varieties of plants my pasture breeding career with them to today. that are more adapted to climate change. SW16/ SEEDWORLD.COMFEBRUARY 2021'