The Baltic Sea is one of the largest brackish water bodies in the world. Eutrophication is a major concern in the Baltic Sea due to the leakage of nutrients to the sea with agriculture being the primary source. Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is the most widely grown crop in the countries surrounding the Baltic Sea and thus promoting sustainable agriculture practices for wheat cultivation will have a major impact on reducing pollution in the Baltic Sea. This approach requires identifying and addressing key challenges for sustainable wheat production in the region. Implementing new technologies for climate-friendly breeding and digital farming across all surrounding countries should promote sustainable intensification of agriculture in the region. In this review, we highlight major challenges for wheat cultivation in the Baltic Sea region and discuss various solutions integrating transnational collaboration for pre-breeding and technology sharing to accelerate development of low input wheat cultivars with improved host plant resistance to pathogen and enhanced adaptability to the changing climate.Abbreviations -DDT, dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane; DK, Denmark; ECPGR, European Cooperative Programme for Plant Genetic Resources; EE, Estonia; FI, Finland; HCB, hexachlorobenzene; HCH, hexachlorocyclohexane; ICM, Integrated Crop Management; IWYP, International wheat yield potential; LT, Lithuania; N, Nitrogen; NPPN, Nordic plant phenotyping network; NUE, nitrogen use efficiency; PL, Poland; PPP, plant protection product; SE, Sweden; STB, Septoria tritici Blotch; WUE, water use efficiency. † These authors contributed equally and are presented alphabetically by their last name. 442

In Poland oat breeding began at the late nineteenth century. During the World War II almost all of Polish breeding materials were lost, and then were replaced by German cultivars. The main aim of this paper was to show the level of genetic diversity of Polish oat cultivars which were bred before 1939. Simultaneously usefulness and informativeness of molecular and morphological methods were tested and compared. This study involved 23 cultivars, which were described by 25 morphological traits and three types of molecular markers (AFLP, ISSR and RAPD). Based on Dice coefficient, genetic distance between cultivars ranged from 0.17 to 0.44. The degree of morphological differentiation within the collection varied depending on trait. Nei's genetic diversity for the combined results for the whole collection was equal to 0.202. Neither unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean nor principal coordinate analysis showed any discrimination of cultivars according to breeding period and morphological trait. Part of morphological diversity has been preserved in the Polish early oat cultivars, do not exist anymore in contemporary cultivars, and also in landraces. The interest of breeders in early cultivars germplasm stored in genebank was and still is negligible. Breeding is confined to a few preferred by market morphotypes. So, it is very probable that the gene pools of early and contemporary cultivars could be separable.

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Landraces are considered a key element of agrobiodiversity because of their high variability and adaptation to local environmental conditions, but at the same time, they represent a breeding potential hidden in gene banks that has not yet been fully appreciated and utilized. Here, we present a genome-wide DArTseq analysis of the diversity of 116 spring barley landraces preserved in the collection of the Polish gene bank. Genetic analysis revealed considerable variation in this collection and several distinct groups related to the landraces’ country of origin and the grain type were identified. The genetic distinctness of hulless accessions may provide a basis for pro-quality breeding aimed at functional food production. However, the variable level of accession heterogeneity can be a significant obstacle. A solution to this problem is the establishment of special collections composed of pure lines that are accessible to breeders. Regions lacking genetic diversity have also been identified on 1H and 4H chromosomes. A small region of reduced heterogeneity was also present in the hulless forms in the vicinity of the nud gene that determines the hulless grain type. However, the SNPs present in this area may also be important in selection for traits related to grain weight and size because their QTLs were found there. This may support breeding of hulless forms of spring barley which may have applications in the production of high-quality foods with health-promoting values.

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