Wild Relatives of Cultivated Plants in India. A ...

Genet Resour Crop Evol https://doi.org/10.1007/s10722-018-0662-1

BOOK REVIEW

Wild Relatives of Cultivated Plants in India. A Reservoir of Alternative Genetic Resources and More, A.K. Singh, Springer (2017) 309 pp., Price 156.99 £, ISBN: 9789811051166 Ajeet Singh . P. C. Abhilash

Received: 3 March 2018 / Accepted: 18 June 2018 Ó Springer Nature B.V. 2018

Abstract Wild relatives of cultivated plants are the treasure trove of genetic resources for crop improvement and dietary diversification. Especially, they are crucial for conferring diseases resistance and abiotic stress tolerance (such as drought, flood, heat-shock, salinity, etc.) in cultivated crops and thereby breeding next generation of climate smart crops (i.e. climate resilient crops) for futuristic climatic conditions. Unfortunately, most of the wild relatives of crop plants across the world are being neglected and underutilized, without recognizing its real potential. In this backdrop, the book herein review titled ‘‘Wild Relatives of Cultivated Plants in India: A Reservoir of Alternative Genetic Resources and More’’, authored by Anurudh Kumar Singh, National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources, New Delhi, India is a timely and topical endeavor to provide a vivid account of more than 958 species of wild relatives of cultivated plants in India along with their occurrence, distribution, current status, as well as their future potential for breeding program and dietary diversification. Moreover, the author has also explored the additional utility A. Singh P. C. Abhilash (&) Instiute of Environment and Sustainable Development, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005, India e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] P. C. Abhilash Agroecosystem Specialist Group, Commission on Ecosystem Management, IUCN, Gland, Switzerland

of such crop species for ecosystem restoration, phytoremediation and soil carbon sequestration in detail. Here we distill the essence of this 309-page book for the better comprehension and understanding for a wide range of potential readers like graduate students and doctoral researchers in agricultural and environmental sciences, agronomist, plant breeders, as well as various national and international policy makers and regulatory agencies. Keywords Crop improvement Climate smart crops Dietary diversification Food security Genetic resources India Nutritional security Sustainable agriculture Wild relatives of cultivated crop plants

Wild relatives of crop plants as a treasure trove Meeting the food and nutritional security of the current and future generations (for ensuring a good quality of life and human well-being) is one of the immediate priority of the global community for attaining the UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs) by the year 2030 (Foyer et al. 2016; Dubey et al. 2016). However, sustainable, equitable and cleaner food production in times of global environmental changes including climate change, increasing environmental pollution and soil quality deterioration is the major challenge for humanity in this twenty-first century

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(Gregory et al. 2005; Beddington 2010; Godfray et al. 2010; Godfray and Garnett 2014; Singh et al. 2018). Moreover, it has been reported that changing climatic conditions negatively affect the agricultural production across the world (Dubey et al. 2016). Therefore, sustainable agricultural production practices relied on resilient and climate smart crop varieties are imperative for ensuring the food demand of growing population (Shanmugasundaram and Kole 2012; Lipper et al. 2014; Redden et al. 2015). In this context, exploitation of wild relatives of crop plants are important for futuristic climatic conditions as they have better tolerance and adaption than the modern crop varieties (Singh et al. 2018). Moreover, they have high nutritional value and wide range of ecosystem plasticity, so they can be cultivated with minimal external inputs (i.e. pesticides, fertilizers etc.) and agronomic practices than the modern crop varieties (Wild 2003; Singh et al. 2018). Even, they can be used for improving the soil quality and soil carbon sequestration while conserving critical natural resources. Importantly, such wild relatives of cultivated plants will serve as significant gene pool for breeding next generation crop varieties and also for modifying the existing crop plants to improve their adaptation, tolerance, yield, and nutritional quality under futuristic climatic conditions (Wake 2012; Dubey et al. 2016; Singh and Abhilash 2018; Whitney et al. 2018). India is one of the Vavilovian Center’s of the origin and development of cultivated plants and therefore, the Indian subcontinent is bestowed with numerous wild plant species of nutritional, medicinal, commercial, traditional and social significance. Therefore, the explorations of such wild crop plants are essential for developing site-specific conservation and management strategies and also for adopting suitable crop improvement programs (Hajjar and Hodgkin 2007; Teso et al. 2018) at regional and national scale. In this context, the current book ‘Wild Relatives of Cultivated Plants in India: A Reservoir of Alternative Genetic Resources and More’ by Singh (2017) is a timely contribution covering the inventory of 958 wild relatives of cultivated plants in India with special reference to their economic and breeding potential as well as sustainable management strategies (Fig. 1). While there are previous works detailing the inventorization of agrobiodiversity from different parts of the world and also the importance of securing such crop wild relatives and landraces for crop

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Fig. 1 The cover page of the book

improvement under changing climatic conditions (Maxted et al. 2011; Redden et al. 2015; Maxted et al. 2016; Foyer et al. 2016; Hunter et al. 2017; Dempewolf et al. 2017; Bah et al. 2018; Labokas et al. 2018; Singh et al. 2018; Shukla et al. 2018; Teso et al. 2018; Whitney et al. 2018), the current book is a remarkable contribution in genetic resources of crop plants as it is not only done by a single author but also extensively covered wide range of wild relatives of crop plants such as cereals, grain legumes, oil seeds, fiber crops, forage crops, fruity vegetables, leafy vegetables, root tubers and bulb vegetables, tropical, subtropical and temperate fruits, arid and semi-arid fruits, spices and condiments, commercial crops, medicinal and aromatic plants, floriculture crops, agroforestry, and cottage industry and other crops. Furthermore, the book also covers various conventional and molecular breeding technology for value addition and conferring tolerance under futuristic climatic conditions.


The organization of the book The author has meticulously organized 21 chapters of the book into three different parts such as (1) wild relatives and its multipurpose environmental benefits, (2) wild relative’s distribution and diversity in different crop groups, and (3) conservation strategies for wild crop relatives.

the broader context, he has included different types of wild relatives including ‘landraces, wild progenitors, wild/weedy relatives, wild cross-incompatible species, wild compatible species, wild useful species, wild species of potential use, and also various wild species naturalized to India’. Author has also pointed out the multiple utilities of such wild relatives as edibles, medicinal and even nontimber forest product for local trading.

General background and introductory remarks

Multipurpose benefits of wild crop relatives

In part one, as an introductory chapter, author has narrated the history of the domestication of crop plants and stated that while crop improvement has progressed from the beginning of cultivation (10,000–140,000 years back), the process of crop selection for fine traits and qualities during the last several millennia has narrowed down the ‘genetic base of the crop species due to funneling towards’ better traits (i.e. genes). Gradually, due to intensive agriculturalization, the crop genetic diversity has been loosed considerably. Because of the limited gene pool of cultivated plants, the plant breeders and crop scientists are forced to exploit the wild crop varieties of genetic resources for crop improvement. Since India is rich in agrobiodiversity, the rich heritage of wild plants will pave the way for the further improvement of existing cultivated crop plants (around 800 crop plants) in India. Therefore, the present book on wild relatives of crop plant will be helpful to (1) develop a comprehensive and exhaustive database of various wild relatives of crop plants from different agro-ecological zones of India, (2) formulate standard descriptors for the phenotypic characterization and evaluation, (3) encourage the full genome sequencing of crop wild relatives and (4) create a state-of-the art database on crop wild relatives.

In chapter 3 of the Part 1, author has articulated the importance of wild species as ‘source of genetic enhancement to broader crop genetic base’ with the examples of crop breeding in sugarcane, maize and groundnut. For example, he has mentioned the importance of Tripsacum species for crossing with Zea mays L. for producing complex hybrids. Similarly, he also pointed out the importance of wild crop varieties for conferring disease and insect pest resistance in some of the staple crops like rice, wheat, peas etc. Specifically, the author has mentioned the importance of wild rice variety Oryza longistaminata A. Chev. et Roehrich for transferring the rice bacterial blight diseases-resistant gene Xa21 into Oryza sativa L. for conferring resistance to Xanthomonas infection. Similarly, in US, the corn blight disease in maize was overcome by the introduction of blight resistance genes from the wild Mexican maize plants. Similarly, cyst nematode resistant gene from Cicer reticulatum Ladiz. and cold tolerance gene from C. reticulatum and C. echinospermum P.H. Davis has been used for breeding tolerant C. aeritinum L.. Furthermore, author has also mentioned several wild varieties having several abiotic stress tolerances for developing climate smart crops. For example, the genes from wild species of rice such as Oryza rufipogon Griff. and O. longistaminata A. Chev. et Roehrich are capable for conferring tolerance to acidic sulfate and drought tolerance, respectively. Moreover, he also provided examples of wild species that are used for increasing the yield traits (e.g. in sugarcane and tomato) and quality traits such as protein content (e.g. in durum wheat by crossing Triticum durum Desf. 9 T. dicoccoides (Koern.) Thell.), grain weight, nutritive value, earliness and adaptation, color, leaf texture, delayed ripening of fruits etc. This chapter also reports various genetic resources for other economic uses such as (1) alternative source

What are wild relatives of crop plants? The author has defined the concept of wild relatives of crop/cultivated plants in a simple and lucid manner and described them ‘‘as the wild plant taxon that has an indirect use, derived from its relatively close genetic relationship to a crop/cultivated plant’’. Importantly, they harbor important alternative plant genetic resources for crop improvement (Dempewolf et al. 2017) and also play an important role in ‘‘maintaining sustainable environment, agroeocystems, and agricultural production’’. For

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of foods, (2) sources of ethano-medicinal and floriculture crops, (iii) sources of bioenergy, (3) sources for restricting soil erosion, soil reclamation and soil fertility improvement, and (4) sources for soil carbon sequestration, phytoremediation and ecological integrity. For example, author has reported the use of wild crop varieties for dietary supplementation from various parts of the country. He has mentioned 50 wild vegetables, 29 wild fruits, 8 nuts, 6 beverage and drinks, 4 grains, 3 oil seeds etc. from the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh, India. Similarly, author has also mentioned the occurrence of wild species such as Amaranthus spinosus Willd., Smelowskia tibettica (Thomson) Lipsky, Allium caroliniannum DC., Chenopodium foliosum (Moench) Asch. etc. from Leh Ladakh and nearby areas in Tibetan Plateau. Similarly, around 9000 species having ethano-medicinal significance have been reported from India and many of the can be directly used as medicinals or can be used as genetic resources to improve the medicinal properties of cultivated species. Interestingly, the Indian subcontinent is having all types of bioenergy crops (i.e. first, second, third and fourth generation) including oil-producing plants such as Pongamia pinnata (L.) Pierre, Jatropha curcas L., Ricinus communis L., (Jamil et al. 2009; Pandey et al. 2009; Abhilash et al. 2013) Sapindus mukorossi Gaertn., and S. trifoliatus L. and dedicated bioenergy crops such as Eucalyptus, Poplar, Willow, Birch, Giant reed, Reed canary grass, Switch grass, Elephant grass and Johnson grass (Tripathi et al. 2014; Edrisi et al. 2015; Edirisi and Abhilash 2016; Tripathi et al. 2016). In addition, the book also covers various forage and agroforestry crops from arid and semi-arid regions for biological carbon sequestration and phytoremediation. For example, species like Acacia, Eucalyptus, Prosopis, Populus, Salix, Betula, Pinus, Bamboo, Bothriochloa, Cenchrus, Cynodon, Dichanthium (grasses), Desmodium, Lablab, and Mucuna (forage legumes) are candidate species for soil carbon sequestration. Similarly, species like Brassica juncea L., B. carinata A. Braun, Hordeum vulgare L., and Zea mays L. are the good accumulators of lead, whereas Helianthus annuus L. and Salix viminalis L. are reported for the phytoremediation of arsenic, and cadmium, respectively. Furthermore, wild species such Bothriochloa intermedia (R.Br.) A. Cam., B. pertusa (L.) A. Camus, Chrysopogon aciculatus (Retz.) Trin., C. hamiltonii (Hook. f.) Haines, Eragrostis curvula (Schvad.) Nees,

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Populus ciliata Wall. ex Royle, and Salix tetrasperma Roxb. are candidate species for preventing soil degradation and erosion and whereas the species like Medicago lupulina L., M. monantha (C.A. Mey.) Trautv. and Alnus nepalensis D. Don (Betulaceae) can be used for restoring degraded soils. Distribution and diversity of wild relatives in India The part two of the book (i.e. Chapter 4–16) provides an extensive description on the distribution as well the diversity of crop wild relatives in India. For this, author has distinctly grouped into different crop groups such as (1) cereals, (2) grain legumes, (3) oilseeds, (4) fiber crops, (5) forage crops, (6) fruity vegetables, (7) leafy vegetables, (8) root, tuber, and bulb vegetables, (9) tropical and subtropical fruits and nuts, (10) temperate fruits, (11) arid and semi-arid fruits, (12) spices and condiments, (13) commercial crops, (14) medicinal and aromatic plants, (15) floriculture crops, (16) agroforestry crops, and (17) cottage industry crops along the length and breadth of the country (Fig. 2). In chapter 4, author has mentioned wild relatives of some staple crops like rice (Oryza coarctata Roxb.; syn. Porteresia coarctata (Roxb.) Tateoka; Sclerophyllum coarctatum (Roxb.) Griff., O. granulata Nees et Arn. ex Watt, O. inandamanica J.L. Ellis; syn. O. meyeriana (Zoll. et Moritzi) Baill. var. inandamanica J.L. Ellis, O. minuta J. Presl et C. Presl, O. nivara Sharma et Shastry, O. officinalis Wall. ex Watt, O. rufipogon etc.), wheat (Triticum sphaerococcum Perc., and T. compactum) and millets (Eleusine indica (L.) Gaertn., Sorghum arundinaceum (Desv.) Stapf, S. controversum (Steud.) Snowden, S. deccanense Stapf ex Raizada, S. nitidum (Vahl) Pers. etc.). Similarly, the unusual diversity of grain legumes i.e. Cajanus mentioned in chapter 5 (15 species) provides the strong genetic backup for the future-breeding program. Similarly, author has presented the diversity and distribution of oil seed crops (e.g. Brassica napus subsp. napus var. quadrivalvis (Hook. f. et Thom.) O. Schulz, B. tournefortii Gouan, B. rapa var. trilocularis (Roxb.) O. Schulz., Carthamus lanatus Linn., C. oxyacantha M. Bieb., Lepidium capitatum Hook.f. et Thomson., L. draba L., Sesamum alatum Thonn., S. malabaricum L., S. radiatum Schumach. etc.), Fiber crops (e.g. Boehmeria malabarica Wall. ex Wedd., B. macrophylla Hornem., B. platyphylla D. Don.,


Fig. 2 Diversity of wild relatives of crop plants described in the current book

Corchorus depressus (L.) Stocks, C. capsularis L., C. fascicularis Lam., Crotalaria retusa Linn., C. pallida Aiton, C. paniculata Willd etc.), Forage crops (e.g. Bothriochloa intermedia (R.Br.) A. Cam, B. pertusa (L.) A. Camus, Chloris bournei Rang. et Tad., C. montana Roxb., Desmodium triquetrum (L.) DC. (Leguminosae)., Eragrostis curvula (Schvad.) Nees etc.), vegetables (Abelmoschus angulosus Wall. ex Wight et Arn., Canavalia cathartica Thours, Cucumis callosus (Rottl.) Cogn., Luffa echinata Roxb., Momordica cymbalaria Fenzl. ex Hook.f.; syn. M. tuberosa (Roxb.) Cogn., Solanum vagum Heyne ex Nees, Trichosanthes diocia Roxb., Chenopodium album L., Malva sylvestris L., Allium carolinianum DC., Alocasia cucullata (Lour.) G. Don., Dioscorea glabra Roxb., etc.) and fruits and nuts (e.g. Actinida strigosa Hook.f. et Thomson (Actinidiaceae)., Malus baccata (L.) Borkh., Pyrus polycarpa Hook. f., Ribes nigrum L., Rubus paniculatus Sm., Sorbus lanata (D. Don) Schauer, Artocarpus heterophyllus Lam., Citrus indica Tan., Cordia gharaf (Forsk.) Ehrenb. ex Asch., Garcinia indica Choisy, Musa acuminata Colla., etc.) in chapter 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, respectively. As author aptly mentioned, India in general and South India in particular (especially Kerala) has been referred as the land of spices. Moreover, India is

believed to be the origin of ginger and turmeric. One species of cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum (L.) Maton) and its closest wild relative, E. ensal (Gaertn.) Abeyw. is also found in Western Ghats. The chapter 11 describes the diversity of spices and condiments in India and it has been found that the maximum diversity observed in following species such Ammomum Roxb. (8 species), Cinnamomum (10 species), Turmeric (28 species), Nutmeg (4 species), Pepper (22 species), Vanilla (3 species) and Ginger (17 species). Similarly, the wild relatives of commercial crops such as Cocoa, Coconut, Coffee, Rubber, Sugarcane, Tea and Tobacco in India are detailed in chapter 12. The chapter 13 provides a detailed account of various wild varieties medicinal and aromatic plants (81 species) including many genera for dual purpose such as Allium, Dioscorea, Phyllanthus, Solanum, Mucuna etc. Vast numbers of floriculture species are presented in Chapter 14. For example, author has reported ‘43 species of Rhododendron, 1234 of Orchids, 43 of Primula, 20 of Lonicera, 14 of Aster, 64 of Begonia, 241 of Impatiens, 73 of Iris, 43 of Jasminum, 24 of Hedychium, 7 of Pandanus, 37 of Ixora, 14 of Gardenia, 12 of Crinum, 11 of Lilium, 26 of Barleria, 37 of Ipomoea, 14 of Tabernaemontana, 10 of Thunbergia, and 37 of Bauhinia from India. Similarly,

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the chapter 15 describes the diversity of agroforestry species whereas the chapter 16 details the occurrence and diversity of industrially important crop species (i.e. cottage industry crops). Classification, documentation and molecular studies of wild species for sustainable utilization In Part II (chapter 17), the author has paid considerable attention to the proper identification and classification of wild relatives of crop plants for avoiding the ambiguity of synonymy and also for facilitating their proper documentation, crop improvement program and also for devising suitable conservation measures. He also addressed various underlying concepts for proper taxonomical identification including biological species concept, experimental, biochemical and molecular systematics etc. Interestingly, he has mentioned standard procedural framework for doing biosystematics of wild species including the sampling of wild populations for documenting variations, ecological observation methods, collection of specimens for herbarium preparation and also for cultivation in experimental gardens, extracting information on species range, geographical distribution, discontinuity etc. from herbarium specimens, proper observations on variations (genotypic and phenotypic variations including the vitality and vigor of hybrids) under controlled environment and even cytological, anatomical observations etc. This chapter also addresses the chemotaxonomic approaches (using both micro and macromolecules) for the characterization of wild species. Especially, the importance of chemical signatures like primary metabolites (e.g. ethanol, citric acid, lactic acid, aconitic acid etc.) and secondary metabolites like phenolic compounds (flavonoids, phenolic acids, coumarins, xanthones, quinones etc.), terpenes (monoterpenes, diterpenes, sesquiterpenes, triterpene, tertraterpene, polyterpene etc.), tannins (both hydrolysable, and condensed), alkaloids, glucosinolates etc. for the characterization of crop wild relative deserves special attention. The author has also mentioned various nucleotides (i.e. nuclear, chloroplast, mitochondrial and ribosomal) useful for the biosystematics study of wild crop relatives. The genepool concept (primary, secondary and tertiary gene pool) and various factors contributing to gene pool for better

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management and use of genetic resources were also discussed in that chapter. Author has also dedicated a separate chapter on collection strategies (chapter 18) for addressing various issues regarding the collection of wild crop relatives such as (1) proper planning procedures, (2) selection of suitable sites and population’s, (3) number of samples to be collected, (4) minimum number of plants to be sampled, (5) sample size and seeds per plant, (6) sampling approaches, (7) seed collection, (8) information documentation and (9) post collection care. Author has also discussed probable approaches for promoting cultivation and conservation of various wild relatives of crop plants by adopting traditional conservation strategies (chapter 19) and also the proper implementation of various regulatory mechanisms applicable for agrobiodiversity management. This book also details the merits and demerits of various breeding strategies (chapter 20) for the use of wild relatives including the identification of potentially valuable species for the prioritization of breeding program, conventional cytogenetic manipulations, as well as various sexual and asexual biotechnological breeding strategies for improving wild crop relatives for conferring desired traits for sustainable utilization. Last but not least, the author has mentioned various future prospects (chapter 21) for the conservation and management of wild crop relatives such as (1) the formulation of suitable action plant for the protection and conservation of most threatened species, (2) the need of awareness development regarding the importance of such wild species, (3) building comprehensive strategies for the extensive documentation and collection of such wild relative of Indian origin/indigenous to India, (4) developing continued conservation strategies, (5) promotion of modern biotechnological approaches in combination of conventional breeding for crop improvement and conferring climate resilience, (6) developing basic information on phylogeny and genomics of wild crop relatives, (7) creation and phenotyping of purpose-driven hybrid population, (8) establishing a predictive network of genotype–phenotype associations and (9) deployment of identified phenotypes into crop breeding pipelines.


Concluding remarks and future prospects The current book on ‘wild relatives of cultivated plants in India: a reservoir of alternative genetic resources and more’ is an intriguing description of the occurrence and distribution of around 958 wild species of cultivated plants in India with special emphasis on the future prospects regarding the sustainable exploitation of such wild species for ensuring the food and nutritional security for the rapidly growing Indian population. Apart from that, author has also mentioned the multipurpose ecological and environmental utility of such species especially for reclaiming degraded soil, preventing soil erosion, soil carbon sequestration, phytoremediation, biomass and bioenergy production etc. We wholeheartedly appreciate his painstaking efforts for compiling such a vast amount of information into a single book in a well-structured and streamlined manner. However, the book would be more beneficial, if it would contain details about the nutritional details of such wild crop varieties and bit more details regarding the most suitable agro-ecological zones for the largescale cultivation of such wild species. Indeed, more studies are essential for developing suitable agronomic models for introducing such wild species into farmers’ fields and kitchen gardens and more sustainable strategies are required to manage such wild relatives of crop plants for the dietary diversification and also for meeting the food and nutritional requirements of the growing human population in India. Nevertheless, the book will serve as a primer for graduate and undergraduate students and researchers in environmental and agricultural sciences, plant breeders, conservation biologists, seed companies, regulatory agencies, policy makers, NGOs and international organizations such as FAO, IPBES, CBD etc. and will pave the way for the proper management of such wild crop relatives for sustainable agriculture in India. The book will also serve as a template for documenting the occurrence and distribution of neglected and underutilized, wild crop relatives in megadiverse countries like China, Brazil, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa etc. Acknowledgements Authors are grateful to Prof. Karl Hammer and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions. Ajeet Singh is thankful to Jawaharlal Nehru Trust for providing Jawaharlal Nehru Scholarship for PhD research.

Compliance with ethical standards Conflict of interest interest.

Authors do not have any kind of conflict

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