Resistance of cool season food legumes to Ascochyta blight

Legume cultivation is strongly hampered by the occurrence of Ascochyta blights. Strategies of control have been developed but only marginal successes have been achieved. In the present paper we present and re-evaluate some recent developments in control in the light of recent developments in crop breeding and molecular genetics. The current focus in applied breeding is leveraging biotechnological tools to develop more and better markers to speed up the delivery of improved cultivars to the farmer. To date, however, progress in marker development and delivery of useful markers has been slow. The application of knowledge gained from basic genomic research and genetic engineering will contribute to more rapid crop legume improvement for resistance against Ascochyta blight.