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Book of Abstracts First Legume Society Conference 2013: A Legume Odyssey Novi Sad, Serbia, 9-11 May 2013
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Legume Improvement Program at AVRDC –The World Vegetable Center: Impact and
future prospects
Ramakrishnan Nair 1 , Roland Schafleitner 2 , Warwick Easdown 1 , Andreas Ebert 2 , Peter Hanson 2 ,
Jacqueline d'A Hughes 2 , Dyno Keatinge 2
1 AVRDC – The World Vegetable Center, South Asia, ICRISAT Campus, Patancheru, Hyderabad, India
2 AVRDC – The World Vegetable Center, Shanhua, Tainan, Taiwan
Legume breeding atAVRDC– The World Vegetable Center currently focuses on two crops:
mungbean (Vigna radiata (L.) Wilzcek) and vegetable soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merrill). High
yielding, short duration mungbean varieties conventionallybred by AVRDC in conjunction with
29 national partners across Asia revolutionized the industry over the last two decades and
increased global production by more thana third. To further improve productivity,the genetic
base of the crop needs to be broadened by using parents from different backgrounds, and by
interspecific hybridizationto tackle problems such as mungbean yellow mosaic disease. New
sources of resistance to this disease have been identified in related species such as black gram
(Vigna mungo (L.) Hepper) and are being introgressed into elite mungbean lines. Improving
protein qualitybytransferring high methionine and bruchid resistance traits from black gram is
also in progress. Improvement of vegetable soybeanwith higher pod yield, improved seed size
and color, higher sugar content andbasmati flavor includes the use of selections from local
landraces and the transfer of desirable traits from grain soybean.More than 3000 vegetable
soybean breeding lines have been distributed to researchers worldwide, including those that are
less sensitive to photoperiod and temperature to extend adaptability to tropical zones.Ongoing
efforts to promote vegetable soybean as a nutritious legume in South Asia, Central Asia and
Africa are supported by improvedseed supplies and recipes developed toadapt this vegetable to
local consumption patterns.
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