Wheat scientists will borrow genes from wild ancestors of the staple grain to give it stamina to withstand the stresses of climate change, says the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, known by its Spanish abbreviation CIMMYT. “A new generation of plant screening and molecular technologies can speed up our capacity to transfer stress-tolerance traits into new wheat varieties. Wild relatives of wheat, which evolved in hot and dry places, will provide the crucial genes we need for crop improvement,” said Matthew Reynolds of CIMMYT, who helped organize a meeting of scientists from 22 wheat-growing nations to discuss the plan to improve drought and heat tolerance in wheat.
Wheat is one of the mostly widely grown crops in the world and provides 20 percent of the calories in the global diet. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says heat waves are likely to occur more often and last longer due to climate change in coming decades.