Analyzing the Economic Effectiveness of Genomic Selection Relative to Conventional Breeding Approaches

Abstract

Comparing the economic efficiency of alternative strategies for breeding requires to compare the genetic gain obtained with breeding schemes that represent the same total investment. In this chapter, we present a generic method to assess this economic efficiency for alternative breeding schemes. After presenting the baseline framework and the necessity of comparing breeding schemes with equivalent total investment, we propose one illustrative example on wheat breeding. In this application, we compare the use of conventional breeding and genomic selection. With this example, we explain the requirements and the different steps to implement this method. At last, we discuss several extensions of the baseline model.

Keywords: Breeding schemes; Cost evaluation; Economic efficiency; Genomic selection; Wheat breeding.