Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
not generally take kindly to being sold seed of a cultivar
which proves to be of little, or no, use. In the seed market
a good reputation is difficult to obtain but easy to lose!
In most cases the decision to 'release' or 'launch' a cul-
tivar is not the exclusive decision of the breeder. Where
a breeder is working for a commercial company, then
the final decision to take the first steps towards commer-
cialization is unlikely to be made only by the breeders.
Others within the company, board of directors, finan-
cial marketing staff etc. will all contribute to the decision
concerning the potential commercial impact that the
cultivar may have, and more importantly, the potential
profits that can be expected to the company if release
is successful. If the new cultivar has been developed in
a University department or other public organization
then the final decision on release may involve heads of
department and deans of the college or experimental
station. Irrespective of whether public or private invest-
ment has financed the development of the line then
there is logic in the breeder having a major input on the
final decision.
In this decision making process, the requirements
(often statutory) that are made of a new cultivar must
be borne very clearly in mind. If the cultivar fails to
meet the stipulated criteria then it will not be possible to
commercialize it and all the effort will have been wasted.
is described as having uniform white flowers then all
individual plants grown must have white flowers.
Careful attention to the final stages of seed increase
and meticulous care in producing breeders' seed can be
of great benefit in ensuring the uniformity and stability
of the new variety.
Value in release
Prior to releasing a cultivar, breeders must demonstrate
(from data collected from evaluation trials) that there
is indeed merit in releasing the new cultivar. This will
involve presenting data from several years testing and
from a number of locations but the exact requirements
and procedures will vary from country to country.
In many countries, government authorities carry
out independent testing of all new cultivars before
release is allowed. These trials are carried out over
two or three years and at many locations throughout
the target region. The aim of these trials (National
List Trials) is to ensure that new cultivars are suitably
adapted for the region. If breeding lines show suffi-
cient
Value for Cultivation and Use
(
VCU
) then they
will be added to the National Variety List of the par-
ticular country. In the case of EU (European Union)
countries, when any new cultivar is placed on the
National Variety List of any EU country then it is
automatically entered onto the EU Common Cata-
logue and can hence be increased and sold in other EU
states.
In other countries, such as the United States, there
are no regulatory National List Trials in which each
new cultivar is evaluated. However, each US state has
an appointed body of people who will review perfor-
mance data for all new cultivars and determine whether
they merit release within the particular state. Breeders
can submit data for release in more than a single state
simultaneously.
Information needed prior to
cultivar release
Distinctness, uniformity and stability (DUS)
Before a breeding line can be considered for release
it must be shown to be
distinct
from other cultivars
that already exist. Distinctness can be for morphologi-
cal characters (e.g. flower colour) or a quality trait (e.g.
low linoleic acid content in the seed oil). It is some-
times possible to say that a new cultivar is distinct for a
quantitative trait such as high yield but in this case the
new cultivar must
always
express the high yield charac-
ter if release is granted and in practical terms is not an
easy way to proceed. More recently, breeders are using
molecular techniques to distinguish new releases from
already existing cultivars.
The new cultivar must also be
stable
and
uniform
(i.e.
stable over several rounds of increase) so the genotype
must always appear the same irrespective of where it
is grown. Therefore if a new cultivar is released which
Cultivar names
Any cultivar, which is to be sold commercially, must
be given a unique name (or identifying code) prior
to variety release. Within any given crop species there
should only be one with that particular name. So a wheat
cultivar and a potato cultivar can both have the same
name, say, 'Sunrise', but two barley cultivars cannot
