A study to identify research priorities in the area of conservation of vegetable germplasm and variety development

Abstract

Vegetables are rich source of minerals, vitamins, vegetable fiber and contain fair amount of carbohydrate and protein (Singh et al. 2012). Vegetables contain high amount of nutraceuticals which helps fight diseases, hence called protective food. Over the last two decades it has been observed that, there is a change and shift in food habits of Indian population and consumption of fruits and vegetables have been increased, but the productivity of vegetables is 17.3 t/ha which is not sufficient to meet projected requirement of producing 225 mt of vegetables by the year 2030 (Roy et al. 2016). To increase productivity superior varieties of vegetables are required which are resistant to disease pest and other abiotic and biotic stresses and contain high nutritive value. Conventionally cultivated and wild species of vegetables are known to be good carrier of genes responsible for disease-pest resistance, climate resilience and enriched with high amount of nutraceuticals. But in modern times farmers have stopped cultivating conventional vegetable varieties as they yield less, even many varieties have been extinguished.