Chapter One - Fungi, Food Crops, and Biosecurity: Advances and Challenges

Diseases caused by plant pathogenic fungi and Oomycetes continue to cause significant losses in staple crops worldwide. Toxigenic fungi also pose a threat to food safety. Fungal pathogens have proved difficult to control due to their ability to spread on a continental scale, adapt to a changing environment, and overcome originally effective sources of plant resistance and fungicides. Intensive production systems based on monocultures and agrochemical inputs exert strong selection pressure on pathogen populations. A more integrated systems-based approach to disease management is required to delay or prevent directional selection for virulence or fungicide resistance. Recent technological advances in disease detection and diagnosis, along with novel insights into plant–pathogen interactions and the molecular basis of plant immunity, promise to provide new opportunities to enhance biosecurity and develop more durable methods of disease control. Several challenges remain to be overcome. Is it possible to achieve the goal of sustainable intensification to meet projected increases in demand for food and other crop products, while reducing dependence on fertilizers, pesticides, and other inputs? Furthermore, an appropriate regulatory environment is required to enable use of new plant breeding technologies based on genetic manipulation and gene editing. In the longer term, there will be a need to integrate a wide range of approaches to increase the resilience of production systems to biotic and abiotic stress, taking full account of evolutionary and ecological factors.