On 10 October, CRI organised the overall steering meeting of the National Key R&D Programme project "Formation and Evolution Mechanisms of Elite Germplasm Resources of Major Economic Crops". The project focuses on cotton, oil crops and other economic plants and aims to explain how excellent germplasm is formed.

Participants reported on germplasm collection, phenotypic and genotypic identification, gene mining, and the construction of core collections. The panel reviewed progress against annual targets and discussed the integration of multi-omics data across research teams.

The meeting asked each task to produce data that can be shared, verified and reused, to accelerate the release of germplasm and markers to breeders, and to strengthen cooperation with breeding units so that research results reach the field quickly.

Understanding the formation of elite germplasm is the first step in breeding. The project is expected to supply both material and theoretical support for the independent innovation of economic-crop varieties in China.