Europe urgently needs to find pathways towards agroecological transition of agroecosystems in support to food security, climate change resilience, biodiversity and soil carbon stocks restoration. In PHENET, the European Research Infrastructures (RI) on plant phenotyping (EMPHASIS), ecosystems experimentation (AnaEE), long-term observation (eLTER) and data management and bioinformatics (ELIXIR) will join their forces to co-develop, with a diversity of innovative companies, new tools and methods - meant to contribute to new RI services - for the identification of future-proofed combinations of species, genotypes and management practices in front of the most likely climatic scenarios across Europe. Ambitioning to go beyond current highly instrumented but often spatially and temporally limited RI installations, PHENET derived services will allow wide access to enlarged sources of in-situ phenotypic and environmental data thanks to (i) new AI-based multi (agroecology-related) traits multi-sensors devices (ii) to unleashed access to high resolution Earth Observation data connected to ground based data, (iii) FAIR data support for connection with (iv) new generation of predictive modeling solutions encompassing AI and digital twins. Developments will be challenged by and implemented in a series of eight Use Cases covering a large range of agroecosystems but also of ecosystems to demonstrate portability of solutions. Several of these Use Cases will mobilize on-farm data. A large effort will be devoted to training RI staff and beyond through a sustained collection of training material fed by experts. Outreaching activities will aim at enlarging the range of RI users. PHENET will not only strengthen RI but will also have major impact on the development of innovative companies on phenotyping, envirotyping and precision agriculture as well as on the emergence of climate smart crop varieties and innovative practices fitted to climate change and agroecological transition.

The identification of new variability represents a major tool to face challenges to overcome global warming and improve farming system sustainability. Turnips and cabbages, which largely contribute to food production worldwide, are native of the Mediterranean basin. Wild forms and landraces grow under highly contrasted environments. Taking advantage of this distribution, the objective of BrasExplor is to collect, explore this wide genetic diversity of wild and locally cultivated forms, after discussions with farmers on cultural practices and traditional uses, in order to promote local varieties. Collects will be performed along the climatic gradient with a precise description of contrasted environmental conditions, edaphic and microbiome composition of the soil. From 100 populations of cabbages (Brassica oleracea) and 100 of turnips (B. rapa), we will sequence (Next Generation Sequencing) in bulk each population for genome-wide scans looking for associations between nucleotide polymorphism and environmental variables as well as soil composition in order to search for genetic determinants of adaptation to suboptimal conditions. These data will be confirmed under controlled conditions for water and temperature stress and in contrasted field conditions for different traits: seed germination, root architecture, flowering phenology, self-incompatibility, microbiota diversity, morphology. Genetic data will be also used to infer their population genetic structure and to understand the relationships between the wild and cultivated forms of each species, the impact of farming practices under environmental constraints. Results will allow development of core-collections for in situ/on-farm management strategies and ex situ conservation as well as for promotion of landraces and for first proposal of pre-breeding populations.

LIVESEEDING contributes to the upscaling of organic production in Europe through (i) improving availability of organic plant reproductive material of organic cultivars (Organic Heterogeneous Material, Organic Varieties, landraces) of a large range of crops, bred for improved diversity and adaptation to local conditions, and (ii) strengthening and diversifying the organic seed sector informed by market demands. LIVESEEDING contributes to the transition towards environmentally-friendly, climate-neutral, healthy and fair food systems through further developing (i) cultivars suited for organic and low external input production, (ii) novel governance models linking breeders with value chain actors and citizens with local food production, and (iii) awareness around the importance of biodiversity for our food and health. LIVESEEDING focuses on the main drivers for (i) the supply and demand of organic seed and cultivars, (ii) the supply and demand of food products derived from them, and (iii) enabling frameworks and roadmaps through active policy dialogue with national and European authorities and policymakers by providing science-based evidence and best practice solutions to achieve 100% organic seed. LIVESEEDING addresses the topics in a holistic multi-actor, multi-stakeholder participatory approach involving organic and public research institutes (with proven competencies in breeding, seed multiplication and health, socio-economics, extension and outreach), variety examination offices, private breeders and seed companies, organic production and civil society associations. Additional stakeholders along the value chain are involved in the local Living Labs (LLs) and the established networks of organic breeders (ECO-PB), seed savers (ECLLD) and Milan Urban Food Policy Pact (MUFPP). 15 European countries cover the different pedoclimatic zones and socio-economic contexts, including countries with a low level of development in organic seed and breeding in East and South Europe

Climate predictions for Europe indicate that scenarios of severe drought combined with intense temperatures observed during the summer of 2022 are likely to become the norm by 2050. In this context, sorghum appears as an alternative to maize, more tolerant to stress. However, this reputation is based on few studies and few genotypes, which would ideally represent ‘maize’ and ‘sorghum’ as species. The main hypothesis of the project ‘TRIES’ is that these differences in stress tolerance would result from more intense selection pressure in maize than in sorghum, maximizing maize yields in optimal conditions but making it more sensitive to stress. These reputations could be questioned by exploring the genetic diversity of each species, and thus potentially the wide range of traits that confer resistance to water and heat stress available in each species. ‘TRIES’ brings together a highly complementary consortium, including two research units (LEPSE and AGAP institute), the applied research institute ARVALIS, and a public research group managing large trial networks for variety registration (GEVES). It proposes an approach at the forefront of plant design, plant physiology, and modeling, to provide the first large-scale comparative study of maize and sorghum of this magnitude, from intra- and inter-specific variability of stress-related traits to the definition of trans-species ideotypes (weather found in sorghum or maize) for current and future European stress scenarios. ‘TRIES’ will first (i) sort out facts regarding the actual and assumed tolerances of maize and sorghum by conducting a large-scale comparative study of field performance of elite materials from the past 15 years in well-characterized environmental scenarios. (ii) These results will then be challenged by comparative analyses in the field, with a genetic diversity comprising different genetic groups and generations of selection, to test hypotheses related to the impact of selection effort, contrasting precocities between sorghum and maize, and crop management. (iii) Performances in the field will be related to the intra- and inter-specific diversities of processes controlling yield response to abiotic stress, ranging from leaf and root growth, transpiration controls, and cold tolerance, which imposes sowing dates and earliness of genotypes in each region. All these traits will be extracted from high-throughput experiments in phenotyping platforms. The analysis of the relationships between traits will indicate the links between these processes, their breeding trajectories, as well as the opportunities not exploited by selection but available in the genetic diversity of these species. (iv) Finally, ‘TRIES’ will develop a generic model capable of predicting the performance of trans-species ideotypes (whether found in maize or sorghum) sought in intra- and inter-specific diversities accessible through selection and adapted to local scenarios in current and future European climates. Overall, ‘TRIES’ will contribute to the general effort aimed at meeting societal demand to reduce water withdrawals by agriculture, by offering a new quantitative vision of the respective genetic potentials of maize and sorghum under non-irrigated conditions, from the underlying mechanisms to yield under stress conditions, and proposing adaptation strategies to the selection-evaluation-recommendation continuum.

The aim of the INVITE project is to improve both efficiency of variety testing and the information available to stakeholders on variety performance under a range of production conditions and biotic and abiotic stresses. This will be exemplified on ten selected species representing the main features of propagation, food and feed uses, and having an important breeding activity at EU level. The ultimate goal is to help the valorisation and the promotion of varieties that are more adapted to sustainable management practices, and more resilient to climate change. The most critical issues to be addressed for each crop have been selected thanks to an internal survey during the building phase of the project taking into account the wide experience and background of the partners of the INVITE consortium. To reach its overall objective, INVITE will identify bioindicators associated with plant resource use efficiency, sustainability and resilience. It will develop new phenotyping and genotyping tools to measure them. INVITE will implement models and statistical tools allowing to predict variety performance under a range of environments and crop management practices, while considering the economic return for farmers. The tools and methods will be made available for examinations offices (including CPVO) and post registration organisations to improve efficiency and accuracy of DUS and variety performance testing and to integrate sustainability criteria. INVITE will also propose organisational innovations to improve the management of variety testing networks and reference collections. It will propose guidelines to policy makers for including new traits and improving harmonisation of DUS and VCU at EU-level, and for the testing of heterogeneous plant reproductive material. The outputs of the project will be available to all the relevant stakeholders thanks to an active and open dissemination policy; particularly by delivering a Decision Support System for Variety Choice.