The project tackles the problems with crop-damaging fungi, such as fusarium, that can endanger cereal crops in the Baltic Sea region.
The effects of climate change on food quality and feed crops, receive a lot of scientific attention. Yet, we know quite little about the effects of fusarium toxins and how it may hamper export opportunities and public health in the region. Recent outbreaks in Sweden have resulted in an alert system, and there is also a newly developed system in Finland. Moreover, there are several ongoing research projects in the Baltic Sea region that study weather data to predict levels of toxins in crops, and the influence of crop rotations on fusarium contamination, among other things.
In that context, the DSS Fusarium project stresses the importance of sharing information between the countries in the region. It calls for a system that can prevent a hampering, due to fusarium outbreaks, of the high-quality cereal crop production in the region – a so-called Decision Support System (DSS). Activities include the dissemination of such a system. For this matter, available data from each country will be shared between the participating countries. There will also be a study visit to the field station in Choryn, Poland.