TAILORING THE ONION CROP FOR THE 21ST CENTURY. THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGH QUALITY FRESH AND PROCESSED ONIONS

Objective

Background

Onion (Allium cepa L.) is the most widely cultivated horticultural crop in Europe. The annual production is gradually increasing and is now about 5 X 106 ton. The consumption of onion products is considered a growth market. Europe is not self sufficient in onions; we import sweet onion, and also dried onion products.To take advantage of this potential market opportunities for increasing the quality of the onion crop need to be identified and exploited. For onion, flavours and carbohydrates are the most important components of the internal quality. To meet the demands of the consumer, an improved control of these constituents is needed both for the processing and the fresh market. However, our knowledge concerning these factors is limited and this limitation severely constrains our ability to influence quality components.

The objective of this proposal is the improvement of onion in fresh and dried form in order to meet the demands of the common EC market, to increase the competitiveness of European onions in global trade, and to comply with the EC policy of environment protection. The object is to increase our self sufficiency contributing also to product quality and diversification.

Short description of the project

The proposal has four interrelated objectives :

1. To evaluate 90 geographically and physiologically different accessions of onion and 10 of the 600 wild species most closely related to onion for quality traits, especially high dry matter & low reducing sugar content and low pyruvate and low thiosulfinates content. The evaluation will lead to a highly efficient working collection.

2. To make pairwise crosses between the 10 most diverse parents found in 1. and thus develop markers for quality and a high density linkage map.

3. Testing the same parental material (working collection of 10) to isolate and express genes for quality traits.

4. Using the same material to develop a new processing technology for onion dehydration.

Fields of science

• natural sciences › biological sciences › biochemistry › biomolecules › carbohydrates
• agricultural sciences › agriculture, forestry, and fisheries › agriculture

Programme(s)

• FP4-FAIR - Specific research, technological development and demonstration programme in the field of agriculture and fisheries (including agro-industry, food technologies, forestry, aquaculture and rural development), 1994-1998

Topic(s)

• 4.4.1 - Plant health

Call for proposal

Data not available

Funding Scheme

CSC - Cost-sharing contracts

Coordinator

D.L.O. - CENTRE FOR PLANT BREEDING AND REPRODUCTION RESEARCH

Address

Droevendaalsesteeg, 1
6700 AA Wageningen
Netherlands

Participants (7)

Horticulture Research International

United Kingdom

Address

Wellesbourne
CV35 9EF Warwick

I.N.R.A. - COOPERATIVE D'OR

France

Address

P.o. Box 1540
21304 Dijon

INSTITUT FÜR PFLANZENGENETIK UND KULTURPFLANZENFORSCHUNG

Germany

Address

Corrensstraße, 3
06466 Gatersleben

ISAB - INSTITUT SUPERIREUR AGRICOLE DE BEAUVAIS

France

Address

Rue Pierre Waguet - B.p. 313
60026 Beauvais Cedex

UNIVERSITE PARIS-SUD

France

Address

Rue J.b. Clement, 5
92296 Chatenay-malabry

UNIVERSITY OF PATRAS

Greece

Address

265 00 Patras

UNIVERSITY OF TOURS AND PARIS IX

France

Address

Bat. 362
91405 Orsay