Conclusion

Boldly spoken, after its “industrialisation” crop production is facing now “bioeconomy”. This involves closed loop agriculture, resource protection, biological regulation and genetic diversity. Decline scenarios cannot be drawn from that! Those are usually wrong as adaption opportunities and technical innovations are underestimated. Future yield development is not destiny but the result of positive and negative effects of which some can be influenced! At the end it is a race! So far it is not foreseeable how much climate change and production restriction will influence yield – in regard to the “red zones” pessimism prevails at the moment.

A crucial factor will at the end be if by comparison the breeding progress – and thus factor productivity – is bigger or smaller. However, optimism is more appropriate looking at the development on field plots and in laboratories.This applies in particular to hybrid rye. Ongoing breeding projects are already announcing a leap in development for the near future: New hybrids containing the short straw gene Ddw1 achieve higher yields due to an improved harvest index, better lodging resistance and pollination, in particular on drought-prone sites! Breeding innovation in conjunction with digitally optimised production processes can contribute to further increases in rye yield! In the past 30 years, hybrid rye has been the cereal with the greatest breeding progress in yield. The drought-tolerant and resource-saving rye could expand this pioneering role and develop into a highly economical cultivation alternative even on higher yielding sites!