10 August 2024, Africa: The International Year of Millets 2023 called for increased production of these alternative nutritious food crops, which also provide essential fodder for livestock productivity. Climate change, sustainability, hunger, and economic vulnerability are among the most pressing issues of the twenty-first century. Climate-resilient crops such as pearl millet, sorghum, and small millets offer solutions to global hunger while also supporting the majority of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
HarvestPlus is participating and contributing to the pearl millet biofortification breeding initiative, prioritizing traits that benefit millet researchers and communities worldwide. Notably, this publication observed that biofortified cultivars have been shown to provide over 60 percent more iron than commercial cultivars, potentially benefiting millions of people in India and Sub-Saharan Africa.
HarvestPlus’ targeted investment in biofortification breeding has led to the development of several iron-enriched seed and restorer parents, as well as over 1,000 iron-enriched advanced breeding lines. These have been disseminated to the public and commercial sectors through the biofortification partnership project model led by International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT). This fuels the mainstreaming of nutrition traits into breeding programs in the public and private sectors. Significant progress has been made in achieving the global breeding target of 77 mg/kg iron in pearl millet cultivars and elite germplasm. Furthermore, advancements in quick screening tools (XRF) and diagnostic gene markers for iron and drought resistance have improved the deployment of these traits and early generation selection.
These developments have paved the way for integrating better iron and zinc content and stress tolerance in pearl millet. Biofortified pearl millet now meets 80 percent of the daily iron requirements, highlighting the importance of mainstreaming biofortification in CGIAR and NARS pearl millet product profiles and commercial products in India and West Africa.
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