On-farm Conservation and Management Working Group

A draft concept on "On-farm management and conservation of landraces" was recently elaborated by an appointed Task Force (see below, under Background documents). The document was evaluated by the Steering Committee (SC) and received a number of important remarks that needed further discussion and clarification among the SC before the concept could be finalized and eventually endorsed by the SC.

In order to facilitate the progress on this item, the ECPGR Executive Committee (ExCo) decided to convene a small meeting to streamline differences of opinion before drafting a revised ECPGR concept for on-farm management and conservation.

The ExCo invited a group of people including members of the Task Force (TF) and members or observers in the Steering Committee (NC, ExCo), the observer NGO in the SC and the Secretariat (see below, Participants).

The meeting was chaired by Eva Thörn, ExCo Chair as of 1 January 2015.

An agreement was reached, that the concept should be re-drafted, on the basis of a new outline:

• New outline for the ECPGR concept for on-farm management and conservation of PGRFA (11,9 KB)

The main points of the agreement can be summarized as follows:

• The concept should not only refer to “landraces”, however these are defined, but acknowledge the value of managing and conserving  a wider range of more or less variable materials
• An introduction describing the state of play in Europe should set the scene for the concept
• Justifications for on-farm management and conservation in Europe should be explained, as well as  what the specific role of ECPGR should be
• The scope of the ECPGR concept needs to be outlined, with reference to the various materials, production systems and practices, with an understanding that specific actions may be suitable for each different target
• A list of suitable ECPGR activities will be proposed, including work on inventories, indicators, guidelines, and giving attention to the variety of legal, technical and economic issues across Europe, that are causing constraints or offering opportunities to on-farm management and conservation.

The Chair of the Task Force has agreed to work on the basis of the new outline, together with other members of the Task Force.  The composition of the Task Force may require small adjustments, depending on availability of the previous group of people and the potential need for additional skills, such as about legal aspects.  The deadline for the new draft was set to 30 September 2015.

• Agenda (71,2 KB)

• The ECPGR draft concept for insitu (on-farm) conservation in Europe (4,0 MB)
• Comments on the draft concept (1,4 MB)
• Terms of Reference (ToRs) for the Task Force "On-farm management and conservation of landraces" (94,0 KB)
• List of Members of the Task Force