Modern agriculture and conventional breeding and the liberal use of high inputs has resulted in the loss of genetic diversity and the stagnation of yields in cereals in less favourable areas. Increasingly landraces are being replaced by modern cultivars which are less resilient to pests, diseases and abiotic stresses and thereby losing a valuable source of germplasm for meeting the future needs of sustainable agriculture in the context of climate change. Where landraces persist there is concern that their potential is not fully realised. Much effort has gone into collecting, organising, studying and analysing landraces recently and we review the current status and potential for their improved deployment and exploitation, and incorporation of their positive qualities into new cultivars or populations for more sustainable agricultural production. In particular their potential as sources of novel disease and abiotic stress resistance genes or combination of genes if deployed appropriately, of phytonutrients accompanied with optimal micronutrient concentrations which can help alleviate aging-related and chronic diseases, and of nutrient use efficiency traits. We discuss the place of landraces in the origin of modern cereal crops and breeding of elite cereal cultivars, the importance of on-farm and ex situ diversity conservation; how modern genotyping approaches can help both conservation and exploitation; the importance of different phenotyping approaches; and whether legal issues associated with landrace marketing and utilisation need addressing. In this review of the current status and prospects for landraces of cereals in the context of sustainable agriculture, the major points are the following: (1) Landraces have very rich and complex ancestry representing variation in response to many diverse stresses and are vast resources for the development of future crops deriving many sustainable traits from their heritage. (2) There are many germplasm collections of landraces of the major cereals worldwide exhibiting much variation in valuable morphological, agronomic and biochemical traits. The germplasm has been characterised to variable degrees and in many different ways including molecular markers which can assist selection. (3) Much of this germplasm is being maintained both in long-term storage and on farm where it continues to evolve, both of which have their merits and problems. There is much concern about loss of variation, identification, description and accessibility of accessions despite international strategies for addressing these issues. (4) Developments in genotyping technologies are making the variation available in landraces ever more accessible. However, high quality, extensive and detailed, relevant and appropriate phenotyping needs to be associated with the genotyping to enable it to be exploited successfully. We also need to understand the complexity of the genetics of these desirable traits in

In this study, 321 winter and spring wheat genotypes were analysed for twelve nutritionally important minerals (B, Cu, Fe, Se, Mg, Zn, Ca, Mn, Mo, P, S and K). Some of the genotypes used were from multiple locations and years, resulting in a total number of 493 samples. Investigated genotypes were divided into six genotype groups i.e., selections, old landraces, primitive wheat, spelt, old cultivars and cultivars. For some of the investigated minerals higher concentrations were observed in selections, primitive wheat, and old cultivars as compared to more modern wheat material, e.g., cultivars and spelt wheat. Location was found to have a significant effect on mineral concentration for all genotype groups, although for primitive wheat, genotype had a higher impact than location. Spring wheat was observed to have significantly higher values for B, Cu, Fe, Zn, Ca, S and K as compared to winter wheat. Higher levels of several minerals were observed in the present study, as compared to previous studies carried out in inorganic systems, indicating that organic conditions with suitable genotypes may enhance mineral concentration in wheat grain. This study also showed that a very high mineral concentration, close to daily requirements, can be produced by growing specific primitive wheat genotypes in an organic farming system. Thus, by selecting genotypes for further breeding, nutritional value of the wheat flour for human consumption can be improved.

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The aim of the present investigation was to investigate the nutritional yield, nutrient density, stability, and adaptability of organically produced wheat for sustainable and nutritional high value food production. This study evaluated the nutritional yield of four minerals (Fe, Zn, Cu, and Mg) in 19 wheat genotypes, selected as being locally adapted under organic agriculture conditions. The new metric of nutritional yield was calculated for each genotype and they were evaluated for stability using the Additive Main effects and Multiplicative Interaction (AMMI) stability analysis and for genotypic value, stability, and adaptability using the Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (BLUP procedure). The results indicated that there were genotypes suitable for production under organic agriculture conditions with satisfactory yields (>4000 kg·ha−1). Furthermore, these genotypes showed high nutritional yield and nutrient density for the four minerals studied. Additionally, since these genotypes were stable and adaptable over three environmentally different years, they were designated “balanced genotypes” for the four minerals and for the aforementioned characteristics. Selection and breeding of such “balanced genotypes” may offer an alternative to producing nutritious food under low-input agriculture conditions. Furthermore, the type of evaluation presented here may also be of interest for implementation in research conducted in developing countries, following the objectives of producing enough nutrients for a growing population.

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