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| Fig.1. Members of CIAT’s Genetic Resources Program in the minus 20℃ gene bank (Credit: Neil Palmer/CIAT, 2010) |
According to a recent study in the journal Nature Plants, around 95 percent of wild relatives of agricultural crops are insufficiently safeguarded in gene banks around the world. These crop wild relatives (CWR) are closely related to domesticated plants and have become increasingly important in efforts to protect crops against threats like drought, pests, and disease.
