GERMPLASM COLLECTIONS OF ENDANGERED AGROFORESTRY TREE SPECIES - THE CASE OF PROSOPIS-AFRICANA IN THE SEMIARID LOWLANDS OF WEST-AFRICA

The International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) coordina tes a research network in the Semi-arid Lowlands of West Africa (SALWA ) in four countries: Burkina Faso, Niger, Mall and Senegal. Prosopis a fricana, an important agroforestry tree species is seriously threatene d in this eco-region. ICRAF organized seed collections of this species for long-term conservation and subsequent utilization by small-scale farmers in the West African Sahel. Prior to the collection, ICRAF, the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) and Internati onal Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) orga nized a planning workshop with collaborating national research institu tes. Out of this workshop came a consensus on the strategy, logistics and choice of collection sites. To collect as much genetic diversity o f P. africana in the SALWA region as possible, 34 collection sites wer e selected: 15 in Niger, eight in Mall, seven in Burkina Faso and four in Senegal. The main aim of the collection was to capture the genetic diversity within P. africana before the valuable genetic resources ar e lost. This paper reviews the methodology and results of the germplas m collection.