Evidence for increasing global wheat yield potential

Guarin, J. R., Martre, P., Ewert, F., Webber, H., Dueri, S., Calderini, D., Reynolds, M., Molero, G., Miralles, D., Garcia, G., +49 more...Slafer, G., Giunta, F., Pequeno, D. N. L., Stella, T., Ahmed, M., Alderman, P. D., Basso, B., Berger, A. G., Bindi, M., Bracho-Mujica, G., Cammarano, D., Chen, Y., Dumont, B., Rezae, E. E., Fereres, E., Ferrise, R., Gaiser, T., Gao, Y., Garcia-Vila, M., Gayler, S., Hochman, Z., Hoogenboom, G., Hunt, L. A., Kersebaum, K. C., Nendel, C., Olesen, J. E., Palosuo, T., Priesack, E., Pullens, J. W. M., Rodríguez, A., Rötter, R. P., Ruiz Ramos, M., Semenov, Mikhail

, Senapati, Nimai

, Siebert, S., Srivastava, A. K., Stöckle, C., Supit, I., Tao, F., Thorburn, P., Wang, E., Weber, T. K. D., Xiao, L., Zhang, Z., Zhao, C., Zhao, J., Zhao, Z., Zhu, Y. and Asseng, S. (2022) Evidence for increasing global wheat yield potential. Environmental Research Letters, 17. p. 124045. 10.1088/1748-9326/aca77c

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Wheat is the most widely grown food crop, with 761 Mt produced globally in 2020. To meet the expected grain demand by mid-century, wheat breeding strategies must continue to improve upon yield-advancing physiological traits, regardless of climate change impacts. Here, the best performing doubled haploid (DH) crosses with an increased canopy photosynthesis from wheat field experiments in the literature were extrapolated to the global scale with a multi-model ensemble of process-based wheat crop models to estimate global wheat production. The DH field experiments were also used to determine a quantitative relationship between wheat production and solar radiation to estimate genetic yield potential. The multi-model ensemble projected a global annual wheat production of 1050 +/- 145 Mt due to the improved canopy photosynthesis, a 37% increase, without expanding cropping area. Achieving this genetic yield potential would meet the lower estimate of the projected grain demand in 2050, albeit with considerable challenges.

Item Type	Article
Open Access	Gold
Keywords	Yield Increase, Radiation Use Efficiency, Wheat Potential Yield, Crop Model Ensemble, Global Food Security, Grain Number, Spring Wheat, Food Demand, Biomass Accumulation, Solar-Radiation, Crop Population, Climate, Photosynthesis
Project	Designing Future Wheat - WP1 - Increased efficiency and sustainability, ASSIST - Achieving Sustainable Agricultural Systems
Date Deposited	05 Dec 2025 10:35
Last Modified	19 Dec 2025 14:56