Barley is a major grain worldwide. Europe produces the greatest share (~60 MT/yr), of which ~20% underpins its brewing industry that generates annual government revenues of ~€ 50-60 bn and supports 150,000 farmers. Barley has potential as a health-promoting functional food, given its high content of sterols, stenols, arabinoxylans, and beta glucans. It is an important break crop and animal feed, and its straw has a role in animal welfare and nutrition, in bioenergy and in carbon capture. However, yield increase has flattened over recent years and future harvests are threatened by climate change.
ClimBar aims to identify genome regions, genes, and alleles conferring traits needed to breed resilient barley varieties adapted to the climatic conditions predicted for 2070 in different European environments.
The objectives of ClimBar are to:
*At the time of the proposal. Please consider this data as an accurate estimate; it may vary during the project’s lifespan.
Total costs include in kind contribution by grant holders and can therefore be higher than the total requested funding.