Advanced Strategic Research to Promote the Use of Rice Genetic Resources

International genebanks have a collection of over 760 K conserved accessions of various plants, most of these accessions are within the multi-lateral system governed by the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA). However, in spite of the success in collection and conservation, only a small portion of the genetic diversity has been used in crop breeding programs. As climate change-induced new or enhanced constraints seriously hamper crop productions, researchers and breeders should be able to swiftly choose an appropriate set of genetic resources from the genebank and use them for improving crop varieties. This paper presents some advanced technologies that can effectively promote the use of diverse rice accessions held at national/international genebanks.