Innovation in plant breeding is imperative to meet the growing demand for staple food crops in developing countries. Modernizing breeding was therefore a major objective of the Generation Challenge Programme (GCP, http://www.generationcp.org). In this endeavor,the GCP createdthe Integrated Breeding Platform (IBP, https://www.integratedbreeding.net),to provide breeding material,knowledge and tools to assist researchers in their work,including custom-built software forreliable data management – the Breeding Management System (BMS Pro).These activities were sustained mainly through funding by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,which ended this last September after 10 years of direct collaboration. The IBP has proven to be agile, adaptable and bold over the years, and is now applying the same spirit and resolve to find revenue from both public and private sources to continue serving its broad basis of stakeholders, among which national programs in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) remainfront and center. BMS Pro – a professional-grade software package distributed through LAN or cloud – is being used by close to 700 users in over 30 organizations of different types around the world (17 in SSA). We have learned that digitizing breeding is less about technology than it is about changing mindsets;it requires proper support on the ground,and thatmanagement commits to empower adoption within institutions. Although there is still some way to go before reaching routine adoption, a solid basis has been established and continues to be supported by a new generation of African breeders.Breeding digitization in Africa is well underway.

1. 10 years to digitize breeding programs
in Sub-Saharan Africa: achievements,
lessons learned and perspective
Jean-Marcel Ribaut
13 January, 2020
PAG, San Diego
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

2. Where are we coming from
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

3. Challenges: The very big picture
 Population growth and urbanization are generating
growing and differentiated food and nutritional needs
 Increased emphasis on food for quality and processing
 In developing countries, the gap between potential yield
and farm yield is huge (5 to 10 times)
 Slow variety replacement in farmers’ fields
 It isn’t so much a problem of genetic gain per se, but for what
 Without a reasonable crop value chain in place breeding is useless
 Informal seed systems might biase the numbers
 Time to run Breeding 4 Investment

4. Key drivers of this breeding revolution:
Data Management
 Data Management
 Increased data quality and cost reduction at the source, thanks
to better performing tools and processes, will boost breeding
programs’ efficiency and make collaboration more effective
80% of a scientist's effort is
spent discovering, acquiring,
documenting, transforming, and
integrating data
Generally below 5% of the
research budget is allocated to
data management, if any. Poor
Institutional data management
policy
The business cost of poor
quality data may be as high
as 15-25% of an
organization's revenue, and
as much as 50% of the typical
IT budget may be spent in
"information scrap and rework".
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

5. Digitizing Breeding
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution
Key compenents

6.  Migration
 Moving from hand writing to electronic data capture
 Moving from excel spreadsheet to relational DB
 Integration
 Developing workflows across different data sets of a same kind
 Combining different kinds of data
 Scale-up
 Using larger data sets
 Using more data sets
 Data quality
 Automating quality control steps
 Standardization of data format and documentation
 Analytical power
 Running new kinds of analysis
 Implementing high throughput analysis
Digital revolution: Key components
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

7.  Migration
 Moving from hand writing to electronic data capture
 Moving from excel spreadsheet to relational DB
 Integration
 Developing workflows across different data sets of a same kind
 Combining different kinds of data
 Scale-up
 Using larger data sets
 Using more data sets
 Data quality
 Automating quality control steps
 Standardization of data format and documentation
 Analytical power
 Running new kinds of analysis
 Implementing high throughput analysis
Digital revolution: Key components
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

8. Data management integration
Specific germplasm
Phenotype
(target)
Trial or nursery
Trial site / Location
Genealogy
Parental crosses
Environment location
- Weather
- Elevation
- Day length
Environment plot
- NDVI
- CT
Physiology
- Chlorophyll
- Sugar content
Haplotype (prediction)
Genetic Diversity
Physical/Sequence map
QTL Map Gene/SNPs
Phenotypic data
Metabolomic
- Proteins
- Enzyme Genotypic data
Gene expression
Haplotype
(target)
Yield components
Secondary traits
SELECTION
GermplasmEnvironment
Physiology
Genetic
Morphology
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

9. Web services
API
Large scale data
(Phenotyping)
(Genotyping)
Shared File Storage
(Genome hub)
(Seed catalogue)
Crop information
system
Breeders
Users of other
systems
Meta data
(GIS)
(Agroecology)
Germplasm
Pedigree
Data
capture
Ontology
Seed Inventory
System
Trial
nursery
Analytics
Crop Modeling
Data capture
Crop data management tools: integration

10. Breeders
(national programmes)
research & breeding
create foundation seeds
PRA - market demand (general traits and value)
Linking the dots down the value chain Integration
seed multiplication certify
and distribute
EvaluationPVS – product evaluation (adapted to demand)
Extension workers
(seed business)
Farmers
(local market and environment)

11. The IBP Initiative
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution
Your partner for enhanced breeding

12. Where are we coming from: IBP in Brief
The Integrated Breeding Platform: A GCP Initiative
 Started in 2009, ended September 2019
 US$ 40M Initiative (BMGF and GCP)
 Primary Targets: Breeding programmes in developing
countries and CG Centers
 Support breeding programmes all over the world
Strategic objective: Digitalize breeding programmes
IBP: Your partner for modern breeding
https://www.integratedbreeding.net

13. IBP and the BMS
 We are enabling and supporting national programme breeders to
play a leading role in R4D (R 4 Investment) by offering them
access to modern breeding technologies, breeding materials
and related information in a centralised, integrated and
practical manner
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution
Steady and growing interest for the BMS
the core product of the IBP
+5000 registered users
And it keeps growing!
IBP Portal

14. In transfer of technology the technical part is the
easiest one, sustainable adoption is the most
challenging one!
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

15. The BMS deployment in SSA
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution
Numbers, challenges and conclusions

16. COUNTRY NARS/Institute Started BMS / deployment status
Uganda NaCRRI 2015 Server (Cloud) / Well advanced
Uganda NaSARRI 2015 Server (Cloud) / Well advanced
Tanzania LZARDI 2015 Server (local) / On going
Senegal ISRA/CERAAS 2015 Server (Cloud) / Well advanced
Burkina Faso INERA 2016 Stand alone (+Server IITA-cowpea) / Well
advanced
Ghana CRI 2016 Stand alone / Well advanced
Ghana SARI 2016 Stand alone / On going
Mali IER 2016 Stand alone / Well advanced
Benin INRAB 2017 Stand alone / Beginning
Ivory Coast CNRA 2017 Stand alone / Beginning
Niger INRAN 2017 Server (Cloud) well advanced
Nigeria NACGRAB 2017 Stand alone / Beginning
Rwanda RAB 2017 Server (local) on hold
South Africa ARC 2017 Server (local) /On going
Kenya KALRO 2016-2020 Stand alone/ Server Planning stage
Ethiopia EIAR 2016-2020 Stand alone/ Server Planning stage
Adoption of BMS by African NARS
12 servers, plus 3 servers at universities

17.  Modernisation of plant breeding programs is a change management
process; it is not simply a matter of introducing a new technology and
tools and expecting institutions to embrace change
 Enforcement and implementation
 Big difference between the private and public sectors
 Champions, champions and champions, plus the buy-in of upper
management (Commitments letters from 12 African Institutions)
 Needs to happen in an integrated context with appropriate resources
and policies:
 Dedicate time to learn new things
 Data management policy in place and implemented
 Resources allocated properly at the project proposal stage
 Training embedded in research activities
Only possible if it builds on a rigorous (steps well defined) but
flexible (to be adjusted on a case by case) deployment process
Creating a momentum for change
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution

18.  Digitizing breeding is a big commitment
 Continue capacity development of local focal points is key
 Engaging with universities to expose the new generations of
breeders to new tools and technologies
IBPʼs pioneer sustainability model as a Non-Profit
Organization
Enabling the Plant Breeding Revolution
 Subsidized users are people
from public institutions in
developing countries
partnering with the IBP
◦ Receive BMS Pro products and
support services at no cost
◦ Costs covered by public funds
(projects, network, etc.).
 All non-subsidized users can access
BMS Pro products and services
as paying users.
° Prices and conditions for license and
services are scaled in accordance with the
institution’s nature, size and region
° Income form paying users support tool
development and deployment for
subsidized users

19. Conclusions
 Plant breeders are at the forefront of the next food revolution,
most particularly in Africa
 Still some way to go from deployment to adoption
 Impact indicators: cost and time saving, breeding efficiency, etc
 Support and deployment must be ensured in the region and by
local Institutions, creating ownership by users
 The tools and technologies to digitize breeding are available to
most, if not all, plant breeders in Africa
 It is up to institutions’ management to ensure and commit they have
the capability to access these technologies
 It is up to individual plant breeders/ teams, champions, to use the
best available technologies
 Implementation of new approaches is as much a managerial
challenge as a scientific and logistical one (cultural change)
So, clearly some challenges must be addressed, but digitizing
plant breeding in Africa is already well advanced
The shift from deployment to adoption will happen through
breeding projects led by Africans

20. Thank you!