Client oriented breeding: An approach to improve moisture stress tolerance in lucerne

Client oriented breeding (COB) offers manifold advantages as compared to research station breeding in terms varietal adoption and acceptance by farmers in marginal regions. Interaction of breeders and farmers has identified key traits with high impact potential including enhanced water-use-efficiency, tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses, increased biomass yield, nutritional quality, and persistence. The simplest approach to abiotic stresses tolerance breeding is also the most effective especially in forage crops. It is to select for biomass yield which is the integrating complex trait and to carry out the selection in a representative stress environment. It can be more efficient by carefully managed stress screening and by carefully choosing parents of crosses so that various physiological traits can be pyramided. This implies a reduction in the number of crosses that are made so that larger population can be employed, an approach that has been effective in the breeding of stress tolerant, widely adapted in crop plants. Potential benefits of client oriented breeding have been a source of widespread interest and resulted in numerous efforts to achieve the desired synergy amongst different aspects. Presently wide hybridization with selection in the target environment offers the best opportunity for widening the genetic base for stress resistance for sustainable goal. Polycross nursery programme has been used in developing new composite/synthetic varieties of lucerne by various organizations and the methodology can be extended for enhanced level of moisture stress tolerance as compared to existing varieties. Integration of client oriented and molecular breeding approaches and the latest technologies may also contribute to the sustainability of profitable forage crop production systems to meet current and future demands for these crops.