-----------INVITATION TO JOIN FAO E-MAIL CONFERENCES---------------
Dear FOREST subscribers,
FAO is convening the Fourth International Technical Conference
on Plant Genetic Resources in Leipzig, Germany on 17-23 June 1996. The Con
ference Secretariat is currently preparing two major documents for this
intergovernmental event: (1) the first Report on the State of the
Worlds Plant Genetic Resources and (2) a costed Global Plan of Action for the
Conservation and Sustainable Utilization of Plant Genetic Resources.
The Report on the State of the Worlds Plant Genetic Resources will cover
both the conservation and utilisation of plant genetic resources. Such
utilisation will be considered in a broad sense which includes use by
breeders and farmers.
I attach below details of a number of e-mail conferences we have established
on plant breeding/improvement, plant genetic diversity, genebanks, etc, so
as to get broader input to the two documents we are preparing and, perhaps
as importantly, to provide a forum for discussion between individuals
interested in any aspect of plant genetic resources conservation and
utilisation.
We would welcome your participation in these conferences on any topic you
feel should be included in a Report on the State of the Worlds PGR or in a
Global Plan of Action or indeed any topic related to PGR. Please feel free to
circulate this invitation to join our e-mail conferences to other
of your colleagues in this area or whomever you feel may be interested in
the conference topics. We would wish for as broad a participation as
possible, particularly from developing countries, so if you
know of any developing country individuals, with access to e-mail facilities,
who may be interested let us know or else directly cc our invitation
to them yourselves.
If you have Internet facilities you may be interested in visiting our
home page http://web.icppgr.fao.org/ where we are displaying a number
of the 125 national reports on the state of plant genetic resources
conservation and utilisation which we have received, to date, as input for
the Technical Conference in 1996.
Best regards,
Dr. Charlie Spillane,
Commission on Plant
Genetic Resources / ICPPGR, FAO,
Room: C-710 or B-752,Viale delle terme di Caracalla,
00100 Rome,ITALY.
Tel: 39-6-52255392, Fax: 39-6-52255533
E-mail: Charles.Spillane@FAO.ORG
-----------WHAT FOLLOWS IS INFORMATION ON FAO ELECTRONIC CONFERENCES---------
(ICPPGR). Presentation of the Bulletin Board Network (BBN)
Content of this message:
------------------------
A- Introduction of the ICPPGR BBN
B- Content of the Conferences available on the
ICPPGR BBN
C- How can you join us:
C-1 EMail and Telnet users
C-2 TCP-IP and modem users
Annex 1: Background Information on the ICPPGR
Annex 2: Presentation of FirstClass Software
A- Introduction:
-----------------
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO),
through its "International Conference and Programme for Plant
Genetic Resources" (ICPPGR) is organizing the Fourth International
Technical Conference on Plant Genetic Resources to be held in Leipzig,
Germany, 17-23 June 1996. The ICPPGR is formulating the First
Report on the State of the World's Plant Genetic Resources and a
Global Plan of Action for the Conservation and Sustainable Utilization
of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. Further
information about the ICPPGR is provided in Annex 1.
To promote the broadest participation in the preparatory process, the
ICPPGR secretariat has establish an electronic bulletin board to allow
interested organizations and individuals to contribute to this process.
This "Bulletin Board Network" (BBN), will support all major types of
communication tools and will provide discussion groups on a set of
topics, as well as providing access to documents, reports, and databases.
This forum will serve as an input into the formulation of FAO's Report
on the State of the World's Plant Genetic Resources and the
development of a Global Plan of Action. Moreover, the bulletin board
will encourage the plant genetic resources community to communicate
and work together to analyze and solve problems.
The FAO invites you to join this Forum. You will find in this document
the information you need to subscribe to our Bulletin Board Network.
The BBN is working now with a Listserv linked to a powerful BBS
named FirstClass. This system supports EMail, Modem and TCP-IP
access for DOS and Macintosh users. All informations, conferences,
databases,reports, notes, etc... are available for each type of user.
We will also provide to EMail users access to all the information
accessible on our Server: documents, reports, databases and maps as
they become available. By the end of May, this information will also be
available through our Web site (Web.ICPPGR.FAO.ORG).
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Please feel free to contact our Administrator at this addresses for any
help about ICPPGR's Bulletin Board Network: Samy.Gaiji@fao.org
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If you are looking for general information about the preparatory process
for the Fourth International Technical Conference on Plant Genetic
Resources or ICPPGR's activities, please send EMail to:
ICPPGR@fao.org
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B - Content of the Conferences:
-------------------------------------------
Six discussion groups are operating now. More will be added later.
Here is the list of conferences you can subscribe to immediately:
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ICPPGR Conference on "Genetic Diversity"
<ICPPGR-DIVERSITY-L@mailserv.fao.org>
We do not know how much diversity once existed, so we do not know
how much has been lost. Similarly, we do not know how much
genetic diversity of uutility to humankind exists today, so we cannot say for
sure how much remains to be collected. When and how will we know that we
have enough genetic diversity in relation to the types of characters plant
breeders or farmers are interested in? How would such criteria
aid us in conserving for future, unperceived needs? When thinking
about conserving diversity, should we focus on genes, genotypes or
phenotypes? Is genetic erosion a major problem today either in ex situ, in
situ or in farmers fields? If so what are the forces causing it? What can we
do to minimize them? Is there a need for early-warning
systems? What would such a systems look like?
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ICPPGR Conference on "Plant Breeding"
<ICPPGR-BREEDING-L@mailserv.fao.org>
The value of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture ultimately
lies in their utilization. Promoting plant breeding and improvement is
one way of sharing the benefits of these resources. What needs and
problems should the Global Plan of Action address regarding this area?
What kind of linkages need to be made between conservation programmes
and breeding, biotechnology or seed production efforts? What role should the
CGIAR play? The "Green Revolution" succeeded in raising yields, particularly
in high-potential areas. Are different breeding approaches needed for more
marginal areas? Will resources poor farmers in developing countries
benefit from the new biotechnologies? Can more genetic diversity be utilized
in plant breeding? What are the bottlenecks to increasing the use of ex situ
collection by breeders or biotechnologists? Can plant breeding strategies be
changed to maintain more diversity in new varieties? Do farmers still have a
role to play in crop improvement in partnership with scientific plant
breeders?
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ICPPGR Conference on "Ex-Situ Collections":
<ICPPGR-EX-SITU-L@mailserv.fao.org>
The maintenance of genebank collections is expensive; yet, the number
of genebanks has increased rapidly in the last two decades; and, now,
there are hundreds of thousands of accessions stored in genebanks
around the world. Do we have enough genebanks? Should and can
every country have a long-term storage facility which meets
international standards? Should there be a more limited number of long-
term facilities storing material on behalf of others? Should collections
be "rationalized" and "excess" material be discarded? How could this best be
done? What would a multilateral system of genebanks look like? How should ex-
situ conservation be linked to in-situ strategies? What are the major
obstacles to greater use of ex-situ collections?
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ICPPGR Conference on "Regeneration"
<ICPPGR-REGEN-L@mailserv.fao.org>
Periodically, according to factors peculiar to a species, an accession, or
the conditions under which seed is stored, all genebank accessions must
be regenerated. Regeneration, however, carries with it a number of
risks, including selection, genetic drift or bottlenecking. FAO's Global Plan
of Actionshould include the first safe regeneration of existing ex-situ
collections. What would such a programme look like? What is the scope of the
need? Should all accessions needing regeneration be regenerated
(original and all duplicates)? What are the financial and operational
implications of such initiative? What criteria should define which crops
are regenerated first?
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ICPPGR Conference on "Training/Education"
<ICPPGR-TRAINING-L@mailserv.fao.org>
Developing countries need qualified personnel to operate genetic
conservation programmes, engage in plant breeding and
improvement, and handle the many complex policy and legal questions involved
in
this field. What type of training/educational programmes are needed in
the Global Plan of Action? Should short, intensive courses be organized
around specific topics or are longer term courses needed? Should we
concentrate resources onhigher academic levels (University) or practical
technical levels? Which topics are most critical? Which or what kind of
instructor should be involved [professionals and/or practitioners
and/or farmers]? Who should the target audience for such training be?
What would the goals of such efforts be? Is there a need for advanced
courses to be established in developing countries? At what level
[regional/sub-regional]?
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ICPPGR Conference on "In-Situ Conservation"
<ICPPGR-IN-SITU-L@mailserv.fao.org>
Interest in in-situ (including on-farm) conservation/plant improvement
has exploded in recent years; yet, experience is limited. The Global Plan
of Action must address this area and propose what to do, what direction
to take, what activities to engage in, who to involve, what goals to
pursue. Given the current state of knowledge, what are the next steps to
take in this area? Should in-situ efforts focus only on conservation or
on a mix of conservation and development potential? Can effective
incentives for conservation be introduced? How should in-situ
conservation be linked to ex-situ programmes?
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Each conferences will be managed by two or more topic managers from
different organizations (FAO, IPGRI and others). They will provide
regularly summaries to participants in each conference.
C- How can you join us:
-----------------------
The Bulletin Board Network is works in three ways:
- access by EMail
- access through a BBS (Modem or TCP-IP users)
- access through a WEB server (not yet available)
You must check with your Computer specialist, to know if you have a
TCP-IP or SLIP connection (full internet access). This option can give
you access to our BBS named FirstClass, or to our WEB server soon.
These methods have more facilities to manage the information available
on our BBN. However, you can have access to all the information
through all three methods.
A- You are an E-Mail participant:
---------------------------------
This is probably the easiest way to join our BBN.
If you are in this category, you will use your current EMail software
and conventional Listserv commands to subscribe to Conferences.
The address of our Listserv is: MAILSERV@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG.
Here are the available Conferences now:
- ICPPGR-EX-SITU-L
- ICPPGR-IN-SITU-L
- ICPPGR-DIVERSITY-L
- ICPPGR-REGEN-L
- ICPPGR-TRAINING-L
- ICPPGR-BREEDING-L
and:
- ICPPGR-NEWS-L for the ICPPGR newsletter. If you subscribe to
one of the above Conferences, you will be added automatically to this
newsletter.
.................................
To subscribe to one of these conferences:
1) address your e-mail to MAILSERV@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG
2) leave the subject line in your header blank
3) at the beginning of the first line in the body of your
mail, type the following command:
subscribe <Name of the conference>
Example:
subscribe ICPPGR-BREEDING-L
4) Once you have successfully subscribed to the Conference, you will
receive a welcome message from the Listserv, with all the details you
need to understand the specific aims of the conference, how you can get
the last report on the conference, how you can find information about,
how you can unsubscribe, etc....
Don't delete this message, it will be very useful in the future.
5) you may post messages to the selected conference by sending them
as an
EMail to:
<Name of the MailList>@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG
Example:
ICPPGR-BREEDING-L@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG
(Please don't send individual contributions to :
MAILSERV@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG)
.................................
New conferences will be added in a few weeks. To get the up-to-date
list please send an email as follows to:
MAILSERV@MAILSERV.FAO.ORG
leave the subject blank, and write in the body:
LIST
The Listserv will send you all the available Conference and the
instruction for
subscription.
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