Establishing conservation priorities for crop wild relatives.

The problem with trying to prioritize a large number of crop wild relatives (CWR) species is the lack of universal data sets for the prioritizing factors that could be applied to all species. Without such data sets, effective prioritization of all CWR cannot take place; however, prioritization is required now. This CWR prioritization is discussed in this chapter. Specifically, the CWR Catalogue and the need for prioritization, criteria for immediate prioritization, prioritization using geographical unit occurrence as a proxy for threat, and prioritization with simple use criteria for socio-economic value are examined.