An estimated 2% of Bolivia’s land area is devoted to arable farming and permanent crops. Dry agriculture is the rule, and the most important crops are potatoes, corn, barley, quinoa, habas, wheat, alfalfa and oca.

Twelve institutions are working in crop breeding in Bolivia -- 8 are public, 3 private and one mixed. All consider a priority to carry out plant breeding for abiotic factors, to achieve varieties resistant to frost Andean crops only), drought, salinity, etc.; to generate varieties resistant to priority diseases like potato late blight or wheat rust. Several institutions focus on the production of varieties adapted to on-favourable environments.

The main crops covered by plant breeding programmes are soybean, peanut, maize, wheat and sesame. In general, the institutions have given more importance to the use of local germplasm.

Plant breeding in Bolivia encounters two main issues. Firstly, the investments for carrying out plant breeding are limited. All the institutions have greenhouses but infra-structure in general needs to be improved. Secondly, the diffusion of improved varieties is a bottleneck that all institutions encountered due to the non-existence of a national agricultural extension system. Another important factor is the limited availability of quality seed of all the crops due mainly to the lack of enterprises dedicated to this purpose.

Research and education institutes with activities in plant breeding

Public Institutes

Private Institutions

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Information by Julio Gabriel (2006) - Information based on the Bolivia's full report from the PBBC survey. Last revised 31-07-2009, GIPB