PPP NORDFRUIT – for the Future of Nordic Strawberries and Apples

2020.10.14

Did you know that apples and strawberries are the most important species within the fruit and berry production in the Nordic countries? PPP NORDFRUIT, a project within the Nordic Public-Private Partnership for Pre-breeding, is contributing to the important pre-breeding work. 

Did you know that apples and strawberries are the most important species within the fruit and berry production in the Nordic countries? But these are also species with a diversity of international varieties. Since the Nordic production is unsignificant in a global perspective and considering our unique growing conditions, our plant breeders must work hard to develop varieties that are adapted to our Nordic conditions. PPP NORDFRUIT, a project within the Nordic Public-Private Partnership for Pre-breeding, is contributing to this important work.

The Nordic production of apples and strawberries takes place in the outskirts of the geographical area where it’s possible to cultivate these species. That means that the Nordic breeders have a heavy task of identifying genes in fruits and berries that can contribute to varieties that are climate adaptated, disease resistant and with improved fruit quality – so we also in the future can eat strawberries and apples cultivated here.

“The project PPP NORDFRUIT has led to very much new knowledge about different fungal diseases, the resistance in the gene pool and how to handle the different diseases in breeding for resistance” said Stein Harald Hjeltnes, plant breeder at the Norwegian private company Graminor, one of the partners in the project.

New hybrids are being developed

The work within PPP NORDFRUIT has primarily been focusing on known varieties and selections from the breeding programmes. But hybrids have also been developed and studied. For example, strawberry hybrids from Fragaria virginiana x F.chiloensis

have been reconstructed. These species are believed to be the parents of the today cultivated strawberry F. x ananassa

. By studying these hybrids, genes that can be of use in the breeding work can be identified. “The PPP-collaboration is an immensely important meeting platform for the breeding companies and the research- and development environment at a Nordic level. Together we can look at specific problems withing the pre-breeding, which is a long-term work where the actual outcome can’t be given on forehand. But this science-based platform of the breeding is important, and our collaboration has so far already led to several scientific publications” said Stein Harald Hjeltnes.

More data needed

All the partners in the project are working with apple research and this fall they will gather uniform data about different apple varieties’ properties and traits (fenotyping). This can be used for studying genetic associations and investigate the possibilities of genomic prediction. So far, the material can only provide some first-hand indications, thus more data is needed over the following years. When it comes to strawberry breeding, it only takes place at Graminor in Norway and at LUKE in Finland. This material is planned to be studied extensively in a new project proposal from 2021. The partners in the PPP NORDFRUIT have applied about a new three-year project for strawberries and a one-year project for apple, in order to take care of the new material and the knowledge that was gathered in the former projects.

(external resource)

, Institute of Horticulture

Institute of Horticulture