Handbook of harmonised assessment/scoring scales in VCU testing. Guidelines towards more integrated and efficient DUS and VCU testing (D6.1)

Current practices for presenting descriptive and recommended variety lists in Europe were evaluated.

A first survey showed that in many European countries, institutes or authorities publish descriptive or recommended lists of varieties, or trial reports, which provide information about the performance of agricultural plant varieties. Descriptive lists of varieties contain all registered varieties, recommended lists usually contain a limited set of varieties, while trial reports contain the results from one or more years of testing. Overall, a pronounced heterogeneity was found in Europe as regards the descriptions of valuable variety characteristics, e.g. using different types of scales.

A second survey looked at possibilities to harmonise VCU scoring scales. While there is a willingness among the INVITE examination offices and post registration offices to harmonise the scales in the national descriptive and recommended lists, the high value of long-term datasets was indicated and a reluctance of changing their own system was observed among some. The greatest advantage of harmonising would be for those people who are living near boarders of neighbouring countries in the same pedo-climatic environment. If no consensus among countries can be found, establishing an EU scale parallel to the national scales could be an alternative. Another option to ensure better comparability would be an EU website with links to the national descriptive lists.

The third survey focused on possible synergies in DUS and VCU systems in Europe, to see how similarities can be found and how to use them efficiently. It surveyed topics of used seed material, location sites of the traits, IT-systems, already used facilities, semi-automated ways and synergies between DUS und VCU testing. Indeed, possible differences in scales between VCU and DUS should be avoided for those parameters, and it was established that in the future, image analysis could be used more often for visual characters in VCU and DUS.

The deliverable report can be accessed here.

The deliverables published on the INVITE website are public and have been approved by the European Commission.