Global Warming risking Earth's Plant Diversity

Global Warming risking Earth's Plant Diversity



 
May 2007 - Wild relatives of common food crops such 
as the potato and the peanut are at risk of extinction due to climate 
change, an international group of agricultural scientists warned today to 
mark International Biodiversity Day. Simultaneously, in England, the 
Millennium Seed Bank banked its billionth seed against the risks of a 
warming planet. 
The genes of wild relatives of cultivated crops are essential to boost the 
ability of the crops to resist pests and tolerate drought, says the report 
by scientists of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural 
Research, CGIAR. 
The results of the CGIAR study were announced today in honor of 
International Biodiversity Day, organized by the Convention on Biological 
Diversity, an international treaty 
A wild peanut variety 
"Our results would indicate that the survival of many species of crop wild 
relatives, not just wild potato and peanuts, are likely to be seriously 
threatened even with the most conservative estimates regarding the 
magnitude of climate change," said the study’s lead author, Andy Jarvis. 
An agricultural geographer working at two CGIAR supported centers - the 
International Center for Tropical Agriculture in Colombia, and Bioversity 
International, headquartered in Rome - Jarvis says there is "an urgent 
need" to collect and store the seeds of wild relatives in crop diversity 
collections before they disappear. 
"At the moment," he said, "existing collections are conserving only a 
fraction of the diversity of wild species that are out there." 
Extinction of crop wild relatives threatens food production because they 
contain genes for traits such as pest resistance and drought tolerance, 
which plant breeders use to improve the performance of cultivated 
varieties. 
Growers' reliance on wild relatives to improve their cultivated cousins on 
the farm is expected to intensify as climate change makes it too hot, too 
cold, too wet or too dry for many existing crop varieties to continue 
producing at their current levels. 
In the next 50 years, said Jarvis and his team, up to 60 percent of the 51 
wild peanut species analyzed and 12 percent of the 108 wild potato species 
analyzed could become extinct as the result of climate change. 
Most of the wild species that remain will be confined to much smaller 
areas, further eroding their capacity to survive. 
"The irony here is that plant breeders will be relying on wild relatives 
more than ever as they work to develop domesticated crops that can adapt 
to changing climate conditions," said Annie Lane, the coordinator of a 
global project on crop wild relatives led by Bioversity International, the 
world’s largest international research organization dedicated to the use 
and conservation of agricultural biodiversity. 
"Yet because of climate change, we could end up losing a significant 
amount of these critical genetic resources at precisely the time they are 
most needed to maintain agricultural production," said Lane. 
In England, The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew marked International Biological 
Diversity Day by banking its billionth seed in the vaults of the 
Millennium Seed Bank. 
The Millennium Seed Bank is housed inside the Wellcome Trust Millennium 
Building at Wakehurst Place in Sussex. 
Banking the billionth seed, UK Minister for Biodiversity, Landscape and 
Rural Affairs Barry Gardiner, said, "It is an amazing statistic, and an 
achievement to be really proud of." 
"Kew's Millennium Seed Bank must be one of the most significant 
conservation projects ever," said Gardiner. "It is a global insurance 
policy against the loss of uniquely valuable plant species through land 
pressures or dangerous climate change." 
Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the Convention on Biological 
Diversity said, "Climate change is a long-term threat to biodiversity and 
to human wellbeing. The Millennium Seed Bank is a long-term response to 
this threat." 
The billionth seed is from an African bamboo, Oxytenanthera abyssinica, 
and was collected in Mali, West Africa by the Millennium Seed Bank partner 
institution in Mali, the Institut d'Economie Rurale. 
Collecting seeds of the bamboo Oxytenanthera abyssinica in Mali (Photo 
courtesy Kew)
Within Mali, and other sub-Saharan African countries, this bamboo is used 
for house construction, furniture, basket and wine making. 
The bamboo is valuable to local people but over-harvesting has led to the 
species becoming endangered in Mali. 
The species is a priority for conservation because its natural habitat is 
under increasing threat, it is a very useful plant, and it sets seed only 
once every seven years. 
Like many bamboo species, the flowering and fruiting of Oxytenanthera 
abyssinica is synchronized across the region, so that all the plants 
flower, fruit and then die back within a single year. It last seeded in 
2006. 
The Millennium Seed Bank now holds several thousand seeds from this 
species, which will be used for conservation research both at the 
Millennium Seed Bank and in Mali. 
Recordbreaking giant waterlilies growing in the Princess of Wales 
Conservatory at The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. 
Conceived after the first Earth Summit in Rio in 1992, the Millennium Seed 
Bank Project is based on the three central tenets of the Convention on 
Biological Diversity - conservation, sustainable use and equitable sharing 
of benefits. 
Today, the Millennium Seed Bank holds the largest wild seed collection in 
the world and works with over 100 partner organizations in 50 countries. 
In all cases, seed collections are kept in the country of origin, in 
partner seed banks, and duplicates are brought to the Millennium Seed 
Bank. 
The partner organizations form a global network to provide effective, 
low-cost insurance against the loss of species in their natural 
environments due to threats that include the effects of climate change, 
the theme of this year's International Biological Diversity Day. 
Current predictions estimate that many plant species may become extinct as 
a result of climate change. Kew's Millennium Seed Bank already contains 
the seeds of more than 18,000 wild plant species from 126 countries with 
duplicate collections in partner seed banks worldwide. 
The collection includes 88 percent of the total UK plant species, 
including those facing the most threat from climate change. 
By 2010, Kew says, 10 percent of the world's wild flowering plant species 
- totaling 30,000 species - will be banked, with priority given to those 
that are endangered, endemic, of current local use, or of potential 
economic value.    

       
      

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