GOCITRUS continues its journey to provide innovation and added value to the citrus sector

• The technical activities of the innovative project continue their progress after adapting to the current situation
• GOCITRUS members hold extraordinary virtual meetings to maintain project development during the health crisis

The GOCITRUS Operational Group was born in 2018, with the objective of forming a group of experts to work on the identification and appropriate selection of citrus varieties as a basis for correct varietal and production management and planning. GOCITRUS currently faces, in the second phase of the project, the objective of re-organize and define the varietal bases on which to base the citrus revolution towards which our productive and export sectors are heading due to the imperatives of the new relations between the markets.

This objective will be achieved through two main actions: a) The generation of an identification system supported by the Citruseq genomic database, for which the authentication experience obtained to date will be generalized to the rest of the varieties and the possibility of establishing a varietal identification service supported by said base will be studied. of genomic data. b) Helping the producer sector make decisions in varietal selection, considering their particular cultivation characteristics and adaptation to each area, for which an APP will be created that includes the maximum existing information related to current varieties and rootstocks. GOCITRUS has the participation of 8 Spanish entities and its scope of action directly involves 8 Spanish provinces.

Extraordinary meetings and adaptations to the health crisis:

Due to the State of Alarm situation declared by Royal Decree 463/2020, of March 14, due to the coronavirus health crisis, the normal functioning of GOCITRUS was altered. However, to minimize the consequences of this situation, the members of the project have held extraordinary virtual meetings which have allowed the adoption of different measures to maintain the development of GOCITRUS activities and the continuity of the innovative project.

The first of these meetings took place last March 27th and was aimed exclusively at managing and reinforcing the dissemination actions of GOCITRUS, in such a way that the current situation caused by COVID-19 does not alter the dissemination of the results of the innovative project.

Next, the March 31st An extraordinary meeting was held to reschedule project activities and develop an explanatory document for the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAPA) in which to provide detailed information on:

• Actions that cannot be carried out as initially planned but that could be carried out at a later time, once the state of alarm has ended.
• Impact on the schedule in the case of actions that cannot be executed in the 2020 execution period, but their possible execution is expected in 2021.
• Actions that cannot be carried out in any case as there is no alternative to achieve the project objectives.

On the other hand, the June 9 A meeting was held to prepare a document with which to request the Ministry for the necessary modifications and an extension of the execution period to adapt the development of the project to the current situation.

Once these variations on the original project design have been implemented, GOCITRUS maintains its development and continues working to offer innovative tools to the citrus sector.

Progress of technical activities:

The technical activities related to the innovative project have also undergone adaptations to the current situation that have allowed it to maintain its continuous development. Sampling and DNA extraction have continued, allowing a first sequencing to be carried out during the summer of 2020. For its part, work is also continuing on the creation of the APP to help decision-making through sending cards with detailed information on the different varieties and rootstocks.