The International Potato Center (CIP) is partnering with the Crop Trust to launch a new phase of the BOLD project. It aims to turn useful traits from potato wild relatives into a resilient new variety, while strengthening seed systems to get better potatoes into farmers’ fields.
Nairobi, Kenya, Oct. 27, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — East African potato farmers could soon get help from an unlikely source – potatoes with wild ancestors from the Andes of South America. Their valuable traits are helping breeders develop new varieties that more resilient in the face of rising temperatures, unpredictable rainfall, and pests and diseases
The Crop Trust is launching a new phase of the Biodiversity for Opportunities, Livelihoods and Development (BOLD) project, led by the International Potato Center (CIP) and focused on Kenya. The project will move promising potato diversity with useful traits from wild relatives through breeding and testing towards farmers’ fields. The goal is a new commercial potato variety that combines climate resilience and disease resistance with the yield, quality and other characteristics that are good for farmers and markets.
Breeding a better potato is difficult, but it is only part of the challenge. The project will also strengthen the pathway needed to get quality seed into farmers’ hands – bringing together breeders, national research programs, seed producers, regulators, farmers and private companies across East Africa.
“This is why we conserve crop diversity,” says Dr Benjamin Kilian, BOLD Project Coordinator at the Crop Trust. “Wild relatives contain options that agriculture may need as conditions change. BOLD is helping move that diversity from genebanks into breeding programs, through seed systems and ultimately into farmers’ fields.”
From wild diversity to a new variety
Originally from South America, potatoes are now an important food and income crop for millions of people across East Africa. In Kenya, they are the second most important staple after maize, supporting 3.3 million jobs and contributing around USD 324 million to the country’s economy each year.
But growing potatoes is getting harder. Heat and uncertain rainfall are adding to the pressure from pests and diseases. Late blight – the disease behind the Irish Potato Famine – still destroys around a third of potato yields worldwide. Potato cyst nematodes can cut yields by up to 80%, costing Kenya alone more than USD 127 million each year.
Wild relatives of potato contain resilient genetic traits that can help breeders address some of these challenges. BOLD supports the CIP potato breeding program to move beneficial traits from this wild diversity into the crops farmers grow, targeting characteristics including resistance to late blight and potato cyst nematodes, as well as tolerance to heat.
Building on the project’s previous phase, 54 promising potato materials with traits from wild relatives will advance through a structured breeding pipeline. Multi-location testing, genomic tools and farmer participation will help researchers identify the most promising candidates for different growing conditions and market needs.
The project will directly involve 500-1,000 farmers in trials and demonstrations, over half of them women, while reaching additional farmers through extension networks and field activities.
The ultimate target is the release of at least one improved, resilient potato variety in Kenya that combines strong agronomic performance and disease resistance with characteristics valued by farmers, consumers and markets.
The project will also engage the East African Potato Breeding Network to help make BOLD-developed diversity available for testing and use by national breeding teams in Ethiopia, Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania and other countries across Africa.
“Finding useful traits is only the beginning,” said Dr Thiago Mendes, BOLD principal investigator with CIP. “We need to move that diversity through breeding, test it with farmers and make sure quality seed can be produced at scale. We’re looking for a potato that can cope with tougher growing conditions and that farmers actually want to grow.”
A new variety is only useful if farmers can access it
Developing an improved variety does not guarantee that it will reach farmers. Weak links between breeding programs, seed producers and markets can prevent promising varieties from moving beyond research and testing to release.
The new BOLD phase aims to build a seed-to-market pathway alongside the breeding work, strengthening the connections needed to move promising varieties from researchers to seed producers and ultimately to farmers.
In Kenya, the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO) will play a central role in breeding and variety advancement. BOLD will also work with the Agricultural Development Corporation’s Seed Potato Complex at Molo, in Nakuru County, to develop a centralized hub for early-generation seed. This will connect with seed multipliers and youth-led enterprises to support reliable production and distribution of quality seed.
“Together, we are developing a structured seed-to-market pathway aligned with market demand,” said Susan Otieno, Centre Director at the KALRO HRI – National Potato Research Centre Tigoni. “This combination of breeding and seed-system development is intended to address a persistent gap – ensuring that advances made through research translate into varieties and quality seed that farmers can actually access.”
Building on success from Peru
The new work in East Africa builds on earlier Crop Trust–CIP collaboration that used diversity of potato wild relatives to improve cultivated potatoes. That work contributed to the release of two late-blight resistant varieties in Peru, CIP-Matilde and CIP-Asiryq, which are now being grown by local farming communities.
This new phase of BOLD in East Africa takes that conservation-to-use approach further. It links pre-breeding and breeding with seed production, regulation and market demand. This integrated pathway can ultimately lead to quality seed reaching farmers and markets – a benefit for Kenya’s growing potato market.
“The objective is not simply to produce new potato varieties, but to prove that conserved crop diversity can become a practical resource for climate adaptation, more resilient food systems and better livelihoods,” said Mendes.
The journey from potatoes bred with wild relatives in the Andes to farmers’ fields in East Africa shows what is possible when crop diversity is conserved and put to use. Now, the challenge is to turn that potential into better potatoes that farmers can grow, markets can use and people can enjoy.
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Notes to Editors Potatoes & Late Blight
- Potatoes feed 1.3 billion people globally, providing 17% of the world’s food crop calories.
- They are rich in carbohydrates, fiber, potassium and vitamins C and B6.
- Potatoes are a vital food and cash crop in the highlands of East Africa, second only to maize in countries like Kenya
- In Kenya, potato farmers typically spend between KES 96,661 and KES 127,306 per hectare ($937 to $1,234 USD/ha) on pest and disease control, with the vast majority of this cost allocated to repeated chemical fungicide sprays to combat late blight.
About the Crop Trust
The Crop Trust is an international organization working to conserve crop diversity and safeguard global food and nutrition security. At its core is an endowment fund dedicated to guaranteeing long-term support to key genebanks worldwide. The Crop Trust supports the Svalbard Global Seed Vault and coordinates major projects worldwide. It is recognized as an essential element of the funding strategy of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. More at www.croptrust.org
About BOLD
BOLD (Biodiversity for Opportunities, Livelihoods, and Development) is a 10-year project to strengthen food and nutrition security worldwide by supporting the conservation and use of crop diversity. Led by the Crop Trust, in partnership with the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and the International Treaty, and funded by the Norwegian Government, BOLD builds on the decade-long Crop Wild Relatives Project (2011–2021). More at https://bold.croptrust.org
About the International Potato Center (CIP)
Founded in 1971 and headquartered in Lima, Peru, CIP is a research-for-development organization dedicated to improving food and nutrition security, increasing farmer incomes, and supporting climate-resilient agriculture through potato and root crop innovations. CIP collaborates closely with national and regional partners across Africa, Asia and South America. More at: https://cipotato.org/
Attachment
Petra Pajdakovic Crop Trust [email protected]
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