Objectives & approach

The BreedingValue project drives sustainable and competitive berry production across Europe addressing the need for new cultivation systems as well as high-quality produce due to current challenges posed by climate change and environmental preservation.

This will be achieved through:

  1. Designing innovative breeding strategies providing berry producers with commercial cultivars ensuring resilience, without sacrificing fruit quality, across a broad range of geographic conditions.

  2. Exploring berry germplasm with a particular focus on contemporary challenges in breeding, in order to assure genetic diversity and berry industry success across Europe.

  3. Improving characterisation and selection efficiency among berry germplasm by providing new modern genotyping and phenotyping tools for identifying, sharing and disseminating results on factors controlling resilience, stress tolerance, yield stability and fruit quality.

  4. Specifying and communicating sensorial quality factors and consumer quality preferences for different berry species in different parts of Europe.

  5. Identifying and introducing superior germplasm for European berry breeding programmes, as a valuable source to develop cultivars ensuring high-quality yield by sustainable production methods under different climatic environments.

  6. Developing concepts and user-friendly tools for documentation, communication and visualisation of berry germplasm at European level and even beyond, which will reduce conservation risks and improve the utilisation of berry GenRes in breeding programmes.

  7. Consolidating networking on berry GenRes - breeding interface in Europe and provide participation, training and outreach to GenRes conservers, breeders, nurseries, growers, consumers and citizens.

  8. Improving the capacity of the EU berry industry in order to maintain high competitiveness at national and international level.