The names of 100 African crop species whose genomes will be sequenced, assembled and annotated through the African Orphan Crops Consortium have been announced.

Seed Quest reports that this initiative is working towards improving the nutrition of African farm families, especially children, through compiling genetic information on ‘orphan crops’. These are African food crops and tree species that grow in farm gardens all over the continent and are crucial to nutrition, but have been ignored by science because they play no role in international trade.

The Consortium, which comprises a range of organizations including the World Agroforestry Centre, Mars Inc, University of California Davis and the African Union - New Partnership for Africa’s Development, aims to use the latest scientific equipment and techniques to guide the development of more robust produce with higher nutritional content.

Much of the consortium’s work will be achieved through the African Plant Breeding Academy which was opened in December 2013 at the campus of the World Agroforestry Centre in Nairobi, Kenya.

In a related story in The Ecologist: GMO-free bioscience to feed Africa's farming families, Howard-Yana Shapiro, discusses how the new plant breeding academy will train 250 plant breeders and technicians in genomics and marker-assisted selection for crop improvement over 5 years.

The work of the academy will lead to “the creation of improved planting materials that will then be offered to smallholder farmers throughout Africa - seeds and tubers that are more resilient to adverse conditions, including those brought about by climate change; more resistant to pests; more nutritious; and higher-yielding,” says Shapiro.

The list of 100 species is being released so that researchers around the world can contact the consortium with suggestions for research needs regarding the selected species. The list is available on the consortium’s website: http://www.mars.com/global/african-orphan-crops.aspx.

The first orphan crop to be studied is Baobab (Adansonia digitata) which can be used as a dried fruit powder for many products. It is called ‘the wonder tree’ in Africa because its fruit has 10 times the antioxidant level of oranges, twice the amount of calcium as spinach, 3 times the vitamin C of oranges and 4 times more potassium than bananas.

Read the story on SeedQuest: African Orphan Crops Consortium announces 100 crops for sequencing

See also: ICRAF and partners launch first African Plant Breeding Academy