Standardised procedure for Musa germsplasm characterisation

The available genetic diversity of Musa germplasm is an important asset to support efforts to increase banana productivity, make the crop more resistant to pests and diseases and safeguard it against environmental changes. Bioversity, managing the world's largest Musa germplasm collection at the International Transit Centre (ITC), is playing a major role in the global conservation effort of Musa, and in the exchange and use of germplasm. Efficient characterisation is a prerequisite, not only to facilitate the use of germplasm diversity but also to prioritise resources towards accessions of interest and not yet conserved. The Musa Taxonomy Advisory Group (TAG) identified the lack of a comprehensive procedure to classify an accession up to subgroup and subspecies level as a bottleneck for efficient Musa conservation and utilisation. The field verification and characterisation of 720 ITC accessions as well as the creation of a set of 'reference accessions' representing major Musa subgroups will provide morphotaxonomic data and allow to: i) improve and standardise a procedure for characterisation using molecular techniques, morphological descriptors and sets of photographs, ii) test the robustness of descriptors across different environments, ííí) develop tools to allocate an accession to a subgroup or a subspecies (scoring system, identification keys), and iv) provide a manageable and representative set of accessions for research, classification and training. Results of the characterisation will be made available via the online Musa Germplasm Information System (MGIS). (Résumé d'auteur