Abstract:

With the rapid changes of global climate, people expect to change traditional agricultural production models and establish a sustainable low-carbon and green agricultural production system. The income from grain crop cultivation in China is not enough. Young people are unwilling to engage in agricultural production, and the phenomenon of abandoned farmland is becoming increasingly serious. Most of the traditional crops are annual crops, and large amount of chemical fertilizers and pesticides are required in crop production, which has brought serious environmental and ecological problems. In addition, annual crops that have been artificially domestication for a long time generally have weak adaptability to environmental changes which leads to increasingly difficult to adapt to complex climate changes. Perennial crops have a longer life cycle and can grow continuously for many years. Compared with annual crops, perennial crops have higher natural resource utilization efficiency, less labor input, and stronger environmental adaptability. Moreover, the well-developed root systems of perennial crops can not only reduce soil erosion but also reduce the carbon elements transfer from the soil to the atmosphere, which is beneficial for retaining more carbon in soil and developing low-carbon green agriculture. Therefore, developing perennial crops is currently one of the important ways to achieve sustainable agricultural development, but there are still some challenges in the breeding of perennial crops. However, the emergence and development of new technologies have greatly accelerated the domestication process of perennial crops, and improve their agronomic traits while maintain their growth characteristics related to perenniality.

Key words: perennial crop, annual crop, clonal plant, de novo domestication, underground stem