Join eOrganic for a webinar on organic carrot breeding on September 24, 2025 by Philipp Simon of the USDA ARS! Learn about the diversity of carrot traits, and the differences between carrots bred for organic and conventional cropping systems, and breeding advances from the NIFA OREI funded Carrot Improvement for Organic Agriculture (CIOA) project.
- Date: September 24, 2025
- Time: 11AM Pacific, 12PM Mountain, 1PM Central, 2PM Eastern Time
The webinar is free and open to the public, and advance registration is required.
Register now at https://oregonstate.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_RIHnxp7dS1KeRyBY29szcg
About the Webinar
Organic agricultural production systems differ from conventional systems in their management of soil nutrients, weeds, pests, and diseases. Together with these differences in management systems, cultivars developed for organic systems can include traits that differ from cultivars bred for conventional systems. For example, genetic differences in root architecture and capacity for symbiotic relationships have been found to differ in crop breeding stocks developed for organic production systems, relative to breeding stocks targeted for conventional nutrient management. Accelerated seedling vigor, rapid plant growth, and greater leaf area are traits that promote early stand establishment and canopy closure, and consequently improved weed control for organic systems. The same pests and diseases diminish crop productivity in organic and conventional systems; but without pesticides, the urgency for the incorporation of effective genetic resistance is heightened for crops grown in organic production systems. Intra-varietal genetic diversity is being explored for variation in these traits that contribute to yield stability under the greater diversity of cropping systems that are found on organic farms. Marketers and consumers of organically grown vegetables and fruits often place a greater premium on flavor, nutritional value, and novelty, and this broad range of market demands has stimulated the incorporation of numerous traits into cultivars for organic production that are otherwise unfamiliar to most consumers. To meet these diverse production challenges and consumer expectations, the CIOA project has been tapping into the breadth of genetic diversity of the global carrot crop. Continued success in breeding will rely upon screening more diverse germplasm and incorporating novel traits selected under low input, organic management practices.
About the Presenter
Philipp Simon is a USDA Agricultural Research Service Geneticist, and a Professor of Horticulture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research on carrot and garlic genetics and breeding is conducted to improve these crops for growers and consumers. Some of his key areas of interest include carrot and garlic genetics and the development of genomic tools and genetic improvement of carrot root-knot nematode resistance, crop diversity and origins, and the nutritional quality and flavor of both carrots and garlic.
