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Appendix 1

GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ACRONYMS

Agricultural biodiversity: Also called agrobiodiversity. The variety and variability of animals, plants, and microorganisms used directly or indirectly for food and agriculture (crops, livestock, forestry, and fisheries). It comprises the diversity of genetic resources (varieties, breeds, etc.) and species used for food, fuel, fodder, fibre, and pharmaceuticals.

AREA: Agricultural Research and Extension Authority (Yemen)

BMZ/GTZ: Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development/German Agency for Technical Cooperation

CBD: Convention on Biological Diversity

CBDC: Community Biodiversity Development and Conservation program

CCAP: Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy

CGIAR: Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research

CIAL: local agricultural research committee

CIAT: International Center for Tropical Agriculture

CIMMYT: International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center

Cultivar: See Plant variety.

Decentralized plant breeding (program): A well-defined set of breeding experiments carried out in a variety of local sites (communities, farmer fields) that represent real farming conditions, as opposed to a single, central, research station site that does not represent a real farming context.

Ecosystem resilience: The capacity of an ecosystem to withstand dramatic impacts. An ecosystem is the dynamic complex of microorganisms, plants, and animals including human communities and their nonliving environment, interacting as a functional unit.

Ex situ conservation: Literally conservation "off-site." The conservation of a plant outside of its original or natural habitats, such as in a gene bank (a facility where temperature and humidity are artificially controlled) or botanical garden and stored as a seed, tissue, entire plant, or pollen.

Experimental lines: A group of individuals of a common ancestry and more narrowly defined than a strain or variety. A pure line is a clone. In plant breeding, "line" refers to any group of genetically uniform individuals formed from a common parent.

FAO: Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations

Farmers' rights: The recognition of farmers (past, present, and future) as in situ agricultural innovators who collectively conserve and develop agricultural genetic resources around the world. As such, farmers are recognized as innovators entitled to intellectual integrity and to compensation whenever their innovations are commercialized.

Gene bank conservation: See Ex situ conservation.

Genetic erosion: The loss of genetic diversity within a population of the same species, the reduction of the genetic base of a species, or the loss of an entire species over time.

GIC: farmer experimental group (Cuba)

GMRI: Guangxi Maize Research Institute (China)

GRPI: Genetic Resources Policy Initiative

Hybrid (general): The first-generation progeny of a cross between two different parents. An intermediate plant resulting from the crossing of two or more different bioytypes of the same species or biotypes from two different species.

IARC: international agricultural research centre

ICARDA: International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas

ICRISAT: International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics

IDRC: International Development Research Centre

In situ conservation: Literally "on-site" conservation. The conservation of plants or animals in areas where they developed their distinctive properties: in the wild or in farmers' fields. Compare to ex situ conservation.

INCA: National Institute for Agricultural Sciences (Cuba)

Intellectual property rights: Laws that grant monopoly rights to those who create ideas or knowledge. There are five major forms: patents, plant breeders' rights, copyright, trademarks, and trade secrets.

IPGRI: International Plant Genetic Resources Institute

IPR: intellectual property rights

Landrace: A farmer-developed variety of a crop plant that is heterogeneous, adapted to local environmental conditions, and has its own local name.

LI-BIRD: Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development (Nepal)

NARS: national agricultural research systems

NGO: nongovernmental organization

OAU: Organization of African Unity

On-farm conservation: See In situ conservation.

Open-pollinated variety: A variety multiplied through random fertilization; as opposed to a hybrid variety.

Participatory plant breeding: Broadly defined as approaches that involve close collaboration between researchers and farmers, and potentially other stakeholders, to bring about plant genetic improvements within a species. PPB covers the whole research and development cycle of activities associated with plant genetic improvement: identifying breeding objectives, generating genetic variability or diversity, selecting within variable populations to develop experimental materials, evaluating these materials (this is known as participatory variety selection, or PVS), release of materials, diffusion, seed production and distribution. It also could include assessing existing policy or legislative measures, or both, and designing new ones where needed. Farmers and breeders, and other stakeholders -- such as traders, processors, and consumers -- can take on different roles at various points in
the cycle but they join forces to bring about change.

Participatory variety selection: The selection of fixed lines (including landraces) by farmers in their target environments using their own selection criteria. Consists of four methodological steps: (1) situation analysis and identification of farmers' varietal needs, (2) search for suitable genetic materials, (3) farmers' experimentation with new crop varieties in their own fields and with their own crop-management practices, and (4) wider dissemination of farmer-preferred crop varieties.

Plant (geno)type: The entire genetic constitution of a plant variety. An off-type is a plant differing from the variety in morphological or other traits.

Plant breeders' rights: See Intellectual property rights.

Plant species: A group of organisms capable of interbreeding freely with each other but not with members of other species. In taxonomic classification, a subdivision of a genus; a group of closely related individuals descended from the same stock.

Plant variety: In classical botany, a variety is a subdivision of a species. An agricultural variety is a group of similar plants that by structural features and performance can be identified from other varieties within the same species. Synonymous with cultivar.

PME: participatory monitoring and evaluation

PPB: participatory plant breeding

PRGA: Participatory Research and Gender Analysis program (of the CGIAR)

PROFRIJOL: Central American bean network

PVS: participatory variety selection

SDC: Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation

SEARICE: Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment

SGRP: Systemwide Genetic Resources Programme (of the CGIAR)

SUB: Sustainable Use of Biodiversity program (of IDRC)

SWOT: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (analysis)

TAC: Technical Advisory Committee (of the CGIAR)

UNCED: United Nations Conference on Environment and Development

Variety release: The official approval of a variety for multiplication and distribution.

WTO: World Trade Organization

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