Steps in Plant Breeding

A plant breeding programme follows a broadly consistent sequence of stages, summarised in Figure 9.11. It begins with the creation of genetic variation, which can be achieved through germplasm collection, plant introduction, domestication, hybridisation, mutation, polyploidy, tissue culture or genetic engineering — each of these widens the pool of genetic material a breeder can draw on. From this variation, the breeder carries out selection, identifying individual plants or lines that show the desired combination of traits. Promising selections then go through evaluation, and the best-performing ones are released as a new variety. Finally, the relea …