Developing crop descriptor lists - Bioversity International

14 BIOVERSITY INTERNATIONAL TECHNICAL BULLETIN SERIES NO. 13
3.1.1 Passport category
Passport data provide the basic information used for the general
management of an accession (including registration at the genebank
and other identification information), and describe parameters to be
observed when the accession is originally collected. They constitute
a crucial element in the registration process when the sample is
registered in the genebank as an accession.
Passport category is usually divided into two sections:
• accession descriptors; and
• collecting descriptors.
Accession descriptors are identification data related to the
registration of the sample at the genebank. These descriptors are
fundamental to the documentation system since descriptors such
as accession number, genus and species can be related to different
accession-specific data.
Example #11
Accession number
Genus
Species
Donor number
A large part of the passport descriptors category for each sample
is recorded during germplasm collecting. These data describe in
detail the environment from which the germplasm originates.
Ethnobotanical descriptors, such us ethnic group, local vernacular
name, plant uses and parts of the plant used, form an increasing
proportion of these descriptors.
Example #12
Collecting institute
Country where collected
Collecting date
Collecting site
In order to help users during data collection in the field,
Bioversity has developed a collecting form (see Appendix V for
an example of a collecting form for Allium spp.), which is usually
included as an appendix to the crop descriptor lists.
It is important that passport data are as complete as possible
from the beginning, since it is often difficult or even impossible to
fill in gaps at a later stage. Passport descriptors are to a large extent