Introduction

Abstract

The human population growth has passed seven billion figures and is assumed to reach nine billion by 2050 (UN 2013). With such a higher population increasing rate, the amount of food we produce today will not be sufficient in the coming years to keep all alive, healthy and wealthy, which develops substantial pressure on the agricultural production system. Agricultural production demands are expected to increase in the twenty-first century with demands for cereals in particular expected to rise by 70 % from 2007 to 2050 (FAO 2012). Besides, the need of biomass for bioenergy and biorefineries is also expected to increase considerably. There are, however, fewer possibilities to increase the area under agriculture substantially for enhancing production systems in the world. Global climate change is also going to affect the production potential more adversely mainly due to increase in temperatures which in terms reduce the photosynthetic capacity of important agricultural crop plants. Further, water is expected to become a limiting factor in most of areas, and the pressure from devastating pathogens and pests is also assumed to increase, substantially. However, challenges of meeting future cereal production demands as mentioned above will be entirely dependent on the development of potential cultivars well adapted to the altered growing conditions. The tailoring of genetically potential crop varieties with high and stable yield, adequate quality attributes and low environment impact will in turn be dependent on the available invaluable wild/weedy genetic resources and their subsequent selection and utilization for diversification of cultivated gene pool. Gene banks across the globe are primarily focusing on plant genetic resources management activities of elite germplasm. But there is an urgent need for active involvement with all stakeholders to enhance the utilization of crop wild relatives. There is considerable germplasm availability of cereals including collections of adapted varieties and genetic stocks carrying useful traits of interest through to landraces and crop wild relatives. However, this richness of plant genetic diversity is greatly underutilized, with important traits not being exploited into the cultivated genetic background. The conservation of genetic resources must be linked to their enhanced and sustainable use if they carry potential traits to play a pivotal role under adverse situations. Pre-breeding approach provides us a useful tool that can be used for the introgression of demanding traits of interest into suitable, agronomically adapted genetic backgrounds.