INnovations in plant VarIety Testing in Europe to foster the introduction of new varieties better adapted to varying biotic and abiotic conditions and to more sustainable crop management practices

Project Information

INVITE

Grant agreement ID: 817970

DOI

10.3030/817970

Project closed

EC signature date 3 May 2019

Start date 1 July 2019

End date 31 December 2024

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine, maritime and inland water research, and the bioeconomy

Total cost

€ 8 152 002,00

EU contribution

€ 7 999 988,25

Coordinated by

INSTITUT NATIONAL DE RECHERCHE POUR L'AGRICULTURE, L'ALIMENTATION ET L'ENVIRONNEMENT
France

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - INVITE (INnovations in plant VarIety Testing in Europe to foster the introduction of new varieties better adapted to varying biotic and abiotic conditions and to more sustainable crop management practices)

Reporting period: 2023-07-01 to 2024-12-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

In the context where agriculture is increasingly being urged to reduce its dependency on external inputs, lower its environmental footprint and cope with more variable climatic conditions, INVITE aims to recommend new tools and approaches in plant variety testing to better assess sustainability and resilience of new varieties to various and changing environmental conditions. INVITE combines scientific & technical expertise spanning a wide range of disciplines from e.g. plant physiology, variety testing, agronomy, genetics, breeding, biostatistics, bioinformatics, modelling, and economics. The project promotes innovation in plant variety testing by producing and disseminating targeted information to researchers, plant breeders, variety examination offices (EOs), advisory services, and farmers. Policy briefs will also be produced for decision makers
The INVITE consortium had to overcome strong difficulties during the first two RP due to the Covid-19 but also because of the difficulties to access historical data. Thanks to the hard work of all the members of the consortium, most of the tasks are on time in RP3. WP1 performed all the expected experimentations; most of the data have been collected and ready to be analysed and published in the next period. As expected, the phenotyping WP provided and published the most applicable results; they have been transferred efficiently to WP5 and tested by Eos and PROs. The genotyping is in progress with some delays mainly due to late delivery of seeds. WP4 had initial ambitious goals and the mixed model approach proved to compare GxE patterns between countries; furthermore, the analysis of historical data proved to be efficient to simulate European environments and management systems. The Data Sharing System developed in WP7, managed the data for WP3 and WP4 for maize and wheat. The DSS on sunflower is also well advanced and should be ready at the end of the project to help farmers to select their varieties. The two experiments on wheat and maize developed in the frame of WP6 are finished and the first results are promising. A great task has been done in RP3 to identify the main expected impacts from the project: focus groups and workshops have been organized at the annual meeting in June to set up this work. Since we have now final results to present, WP8 has been very active to disseminate them through newsletters, many articles and short videos featuring the project available on the website and social medias. The INVITE project developed a network far beyond its consortium with close collaborations with many European and non-European projects.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

WP1 aims to decipher mechanisms underlying plant adaptation to limiting conditions thanks to four case studies. Tomato varieties were grown with temperature 0.5ºC below optimum, and with 17% less nutrients. Yield correlation with morphologic and physiologic observations as well with gene transcription is being evaluated. In wheat, the significance of the Septoria latent period in the disease incidence has been evaluated, providing valuable results. In apple, epigenetics provided markers able to to differentiate clones. In parallel, cost-efficient methods have been investigated.
In WP2, Three types of follow up actions have been carried on the various tasks of the WP2: 1) Dissemination of the tools developed to the INVITE partners and stakeholders, 2) improvement of the tools developed so far 3) Raising fund for follow up project to push toward higher TRL; the main achievement stands in the funded PHENET European project, started in Jan 2023 (https://emphasis.plant-phenotyping.eu/news-detail/phenet) which ambitions to provide high TRL deliverables on various agronomical use cases. Many actors of INVITE are hihly involved in Phenet as task and WP leaders.
In WP3, first genotyping data were generated in different crops (PRG, apple, potato, tomato) with a diversity of marker systems. The seed material of wheat, maize and soybean were obtained and DNA extracted for genotyping. DUS data were obtained, reformatted and prepared for analysis. Development of methods for using markers in DUS testing was initiated.
In WP4, Data extraction and formatting was finalized for wheat and maize (seven countries) and sunflower (four countries). Mixed-model analysis of GxE have been conducted for yield for maize and wheat within each country and were able to compare GxE patterns between countries. Furthermore, Historical data assembly and development and testing of workflow for simulation of European environmental and management scenarios have been performed for wheat and maize.
The phenotyping tools developed in WP2 have been applied in the WP5 variety testing plots to assess successfully for various traits and crops including yield, disease resistance, drought tolerance…. New molecular markers have been tested on lucerne; an Interlaboratory comparative test plan was proposed in a ring test basis for disease resistance in tomato. Field trials on apple and wheat to to determine genotype x management (conventional, low input, organic) interaction have been succesfully achieved. Digital PCR potentialities for a rapid description of genotype content were assessed in wheat and published.
In WP6, Field trials were successfully conducted with winter wheat, maize and Lucerne. Synergies were established with the European projects INNOVAR and MaxRootC. A Handbook of harmonized assessment scales in VCU testing and guidelines towards more integrated and efficient DUS and VCU testing was produced
WP7 has been successful to 1)collect and encode historical data from Examination Offices / Post-Registration Offices for the main crops (maze, wheat, sunflower) for WPs 3 and 4, 2) make available the Data Sharing System 3) coordinate a data user and provider group to define the requirements for a European database prototype that will be developed in T7.4.
In WP8, communication, dissemination and stakeholder engagement efforts have been initiated. A strategic dissemination plan has been drafted and discussions have started with key stakeholders of which policymakers. In addition, general communication tools (website, leaflet, social media, graphic identity, etc.) have been developed and implemented.
In WP9, the management team The project management ensured smooth operation and application of the Grant Agreement. It also adapted the management to get a better coordination of the activities in each crop. Strategies have been defined to cope with delays due to Covid, data access and health problems of some PIs but keeping the same levels of outputs. Besides, the last scientific and technological new developments were regularly analyzed and taken into consideration in each WPs.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The aim of INVITE project is to foster the introduction of new varieties with high resilience towards biotic and abiotic stresses, high adaptation to sustainable management practices and high resource use efficiency. Additionally, INVITE will improve variety testing protocols for variety characterization (DUS) and performance testing (including VCU) to enhance speed, accuracy and efficiency of variety testing. INVITE will also provide improved information to stakeholders on variety performance under a range of contrasting production conditions for the major crop species that exhibit significant breeding activity in the EU.

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