EDITORIAL. Innovations in Agronomic Resources for Research

Abstract

The concept of biological resource centres (BRC) was proposed by the OECD in 2001, in view to organising access to biological resources for research in biotechnology. This concept was taken up in France by the Bureau des Ressources Génétiques which launched a call for projects to facilitate the organisation of conserving genetic resources into BRCs. This call for projects resulted in consolidating initiatives that existed already and by supporting new ones. In parallel, the Scientific Interest Group (SIG) IBiSA (Biology, Health and Agronomy Infrastructures) started to attribute the BRC label to entities responsible for managing genetic resources. BRCs for research were first organised for microbial resources, with the establishment of the International Microbial Resource Centre (IMRC), then for livestock breeding resources with the Investments for the Future Project "CRB-Anim". In 2015, it became clear that these approaches were also relevant for plant and for biological resources used in the environmental sciences. The AgroBRC/ RARe infrastructure for "Agronomic Research Resources" emerged from this awareness in 2015, with the support of the research institutions INRAE, CIRAD and IRD.