The British Biologial Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), which allocates public funding for research in the UK, and the Scottish Government have announced plans to invest £2.99 million in four projects to benefit important food crops.

The grants make up the first round of spending in the BBSRC's Horticulture and Potato Initiative (HAPI). BBSRC said on Wednesday (7^th August) that the four projects are set to improve food security for some of the world's most valuable crops.

The four projects receiving funding are:

• Controlling dormancy and sprouting in potato and onion
• Establishing biofumigation as a sustainable pesticide replacement for control of soil-borne pests and pathogens in potato and horticultural crops
• Exploiting next generation sequencing technologies to understand pathogenicity and resistance in Fusarium oxysporum
• Strategies for integrated deployment of host resistance and fungicides to sustain effective crop protection

Although the four projects focus on potato and onion, undeniably important agricultural crops, grown widely across the world, BBSRC said the findings could also have applications for a wide range of other crops. Onion is the world's second most valuable vegetable crop and potato is the world's third most important food crop after wheat and rice, with millions of people worldwide depending on it for food, feed and income.

Dr Celia Caulcott, BBSRC Director of Innovation and Skills, commented "With a growing world population predicted to reach nine billion people by 2050, this research looking at maximising yields and minimising losses will advance knowledge and benefit UK and world-wide potato producers, thus contributing to an important UK economic sector and helping us towards achieving global food security."

Further details on the four projects

Controlling dormancy and sprouting in potato and onion

Dr Glenn Bryan, of the James Hutton Institute, Dundee, said work would be undertaken with AHDB and industry partners including Pepsico. He said that, as the long term storage of onion and potato is often necessary, but sprouting is still an issue that can lead to losses and many storage techniques to prevent sprouting remain expensive and environmentally unsustainable, new techniques are needed. To address the problem

The research on sprouting will use advances in biochemistry, genetics and molecular biology to identify the genetic basis of dormancy and sprouting in onion and potato and seek to understand the physiological and molecular control steps, with a view to improving storage and reducing losses.

Establishing biofumigation as a sustainable pesticide replacement for control of soil-borne pests and pathogens in potato and horticultural crops

Professor Peter Urwin, from the University of Leeds, will work with AHDB-Potato Council, Horticultural Development Company (HDC) and other industry partners. His research will investigate biofumigation, a technique to suppress crop pests by introducing plants which produce chemicals detrimental to the pests, such as mustards, into soil.

Prof Unwin will seek to understand exactly how biofumigation works and how the potential of this technique can be exploited most effectively under field conditions.

Exploiting next generation sequencing technologies to understand pathogenicity and resistance in Fusarium oxysporum

Dr John Clarkson, of the University of Warwick, also working with HDC, will investigate Fusarium oxysporum, a fungus which attacks many plants including onion. The disease is estimated to cost UK farmers £11M a year in losses.

Using previously identified onion lines with increased F. oxysporum resistance, this work will provide information, tools and resources which will lead to more effective and sustainable control of the fungus.

Strategies for integrated deployment of host resistance and fungicides to sustain effective crop protection

Dr Frank Van den Bosch, of Rothamsted Research, working with AHDB-Potato Council and a number of major industry partners, will investigate the combinatory effects of fungicide and resistant cultivars in controlling fungal diseases.

He believes, "Integrated control, where two or more control measures are applied, is widely believed to be more sustainable than over-reliance on one control option." The project will use experimental and modelling approaches to analyse the durability of integrated control strategies using fungicides and resistant cultivars.

An integrated control strategy for potato blight will be developed to be implemented through the AHDB-Potato Council and industry partners. Models that can be used develop reliable integrated sustainable disease control strategies for pathogen-crop systems with also be established.