The World Wheat Book

It is fifteen years since Volume 1 of The World Wheat Book was completed and
five years since Volume 2 was published. The intervening years have seen many
changes in the world economy, in agriculture in the countries where wheat is
grown, and most of all developments in the technical approaches now being
deployed in wheat breeding.

This third volume updates – and complements – the first two volumes by adding
to the countries discussed, giving an update on associated technologies and
giving an insight into the means to enhance production in a changing
environment.

The opening chapters summarize the history of wheat growing and breeding, and
the current status of breeding in the countries not covered in Volumes 1 and
2. The next set of chapters looks at new breeding strategies currently being
deployed. The third set of chapters reviews some of the physiological
challenges with the fourth set reviewing the contribution genetic resources
from related species can make to meeting these. The fifth set of chapters
explores the inter-relationship between man and wheat both from a historical
point of view but also from a nutrition standpoint. Finally the last two
chapters look at the ever-increasing challenges posed by competition with
other crops for land usage as well as international trade.

As with Volumes 1 and 2, this third Volume is subtitled A History of Wheat
Breeding. Together these three volumes, spanning twenty-five years of wheat
research, record and discuss the continually evolving history of wheat
breeding.

As stated by Jean-Yves Foucault, Chairman of the Board of Limagrain, in his
Preface: “…we have provided our fellows a synthesis of wheat genetic resources
of the planet along with a history and a panorama of its production and its
research”