IAEA-TECDOC-1384 
                     Low cost options for 
             tissue culture technology in 
                     developing countries 
                 Proceedings of a Technical Meeting organized by the 
       Joint FAO/IAEA Division of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture 
                        and held in Vienna, 26–30 August 2002 
                                      February 2004 
                 The originating Section of this publication in the IAEA was: 
                      Plant Breeding and Genetics Section 
                       International Atomic Energy Agency 
                          Wagramer Strasse 5 
                            P.O. Box 100 
                         A-1400 Vienna, Austria 
               LOW COST OPTIONS FOR TISSUE CULTURE TECHNOLOGY 
                       IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES 
                         IAEA, VIENNA, 2003 
                         IAEA-TECDOC-1384
                         ISBN 92–0–115903–X
                          ISSN 1011–4289 
                           © IAEA, 2004
                        Printed by the IAEA in Austria 
                           February 2004
                      FOREWORD
      Tissue culture technology is used for the production of doubled haploids, cryopreservation, 
      propagating new plant varieties, conserving rare and endangered plants, difficult-to-propagate 
      plants, and to produce secondary metabolites and transgenic plants. The production of high 
      quality planting material of crop plants and fruit trees, propagated from vegetative parts, has 
      created new opportunities in global trading, benefited growers, farmers, and nursery owners, 
      and improved rural employment. However, there are still major opportunities to produce and 
      distribute high quality planting material, e.g. crops like banana, date palm, cassava, pineapple, 
      plantain, potato, sugarcane, sweet potato, yams, ornamentals, fruit and forest trees. 
      The main advantage of tissue culture technology lies in the production of high quality and 
      uniform planting material that can be multiplied on a year-round basis under disease-free 
      conditions anywhere irrespective of the season and weather. However, the technology is 
      capital, labor and energy intensive. Although, labor is cheap in many developing countries, 
      the resources of trained personnel and equipment are often not readily available. In addition, 
      energy, particularly electricity, and clean water are costly. The energy requirements for tissue 
      culture technology depend on day temperature, day-length and relative humidity, and they 
      have to be controlled during the process of propagation. Individual plant species also differ in 
      their growth requirements. Hence, it is necessary to have low cost options for weaning, 
      hardening of micropropagated plants and finally growing them in the field. 
      This publication describes options for reducing costs to establish and operate tissue culture 
      facilities and primarily focus on plant micropropagation. It includes papers on the basics of 
      tissue culture technology, low cost options for the design of laboratories, use of culture media 
      and containers, energy and labor saving, integration and adoption of low cost options, and 
      increasing plant survival after propagation, bioreactors, and outreach of material to the 
      growers and farmers in developing countries. Bioreactors in plant propagation can produce 
      millions of plants and may cut down the cost of plant production, which is yet not commonly 
      used in developing countries. However, in the near future it could be well integrated into large 
      scale commercial micropropagation in both developed and developing countries. In all cases, 
      such options must be integrated without reducing the efficiency of plant propagation and 
      compromising the plant quality. 
         This TECDOC was prepared on the basis of contributions made by the participants in 
      the Technical Meeting on Low Cost Tissue Culture Technology for Developing Countries, 
      Vienna, 26–30 August 2002. This publication should be of great value to plant propagators, 
      managers of tissue culture laboratories, scientists, organizations contemplating the 
      establishment of new laboratories, and ongoing commercial concerns, all of whom may wish 
      to incorporate low cost options into their day-to-day operations. Also, it would greatly serve 
      plant propagation enterprises in developing countries with scarce funds and poor 
      infrastructure for sustainable food production. Many of the options described can also be 
      integrated in tissue culture laboratories that use mutation induction to develop new mutant 
      varieties of both vegetatively and seed propagated plants, and for rapid release of the selected 
      mutants. The IAEA and FAO wish to thank B.S. Ahloowalia, former staff member of the 
      Joint FAO/IAEA Division of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture, for compiling and 
      preparing this publication. The IAEA officer responsible for the publication is S. Mohan Jain. 
                       EDITORIAL NOTE
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