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Perennial Grains Research Meeting 2025

March 11-13, 2025
@ CIMMYT headquarters – Improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers around the world

We look forward to welcoming you to the 2025 International Perennial Grain Meeting, co-hosted by The Land Institute (TLI) and CIMMYT the week of March 10th, 2025 at the CIMMYT Campus in Texcoco, Mexico. Core conference days will be March 11-13th with an agenda focused on developing the Pathways to a Perennial Future and with confirmed participation of over 100 scientists and partners from 30+ countries around the world.

We will be using this website to share information about Texcoco, the CIMMYT campus, and the convening agenda as it’s available. Please be sure to check your inboxes for additional information about your individual RSVPs, bookings, and logistics.

With best wishes,
Tim Crews, Director of The International Initiative at The Land Institute
Sieglinde Snapp, Program Director of Sustainable Agrifood Systems (SAS) at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT)

Pathways to a Perennial Future

Event in brief: As enthusiasm for regenerative agriculture continues to expand globally, the perennialization of grain production is the next frontier. Not only will the growth of perennial grains themselves improve soil health, but perennial grain cultivation has the potential to increase nutrient retention, reduce energy use, and enhance farmer income; they are part of the solution for global food security and climate change.

From March 11-13, 2025, The Land Institute will convene a meeting with CIMMYT to advance research and programming on breeding, cropping systems and adoption of perennial grains. Sessions will be organized around pivotal, multi-disciplinary themes

that are central to advancing perennial grains research, especially in an international context:

  • Perennials for climate change mitigation and adaptation
  • Breeding methodologies for perennial grain crops
  • Intercropping and cropping system diversification strategies
  • Intellectual property rights
  • International data sharing
  • Participatory/Transdisciplinary methods
  • Defining and participation in regional perennial research hubs
  • New candidate species for de Novo domestication
  • Under-researched areas of ecological intensification

Discussion and working group sessions around these themes are expected to culminate in identifying ways forward for the Global Network to make progress on setting up systems, resources, or initiatives; the goal is to have a globally informed roadmap that will help guide TLI and other regional hubs in making progress on perennial research and development. Side meetings of crop or topic-specific subgroups can be organized for March 10 and 14, the dates preceding and following the core meeting.

Event Context: Previous International Perennial Grain Research meetings held in Rome, Italy (2013), Estes Park, Colorado, US (2014) and Lund, Sweden (2019) were focused on connecting and coordinating existing perennial grain researchers around the world. Organized as research workshops these meetings were successful in advancing crop specific partnerships, developing flagship research initiatives and developing global networks. Building on the expanded research collaborations that were made at these workshops, the 2025 meeting will look to further expand the scope and goals of previous convenings by inviting new partners into perennial grain research and going beyond crop-specific working groups to focus on cross-cutting themes.

Invitations and Space Limits: Due to space constraints at CIMMYT, not all researchers with interest in attending will be able to participate. Please feel free to let colleagues know about this meeting, kindly noting that we are encouraging participation by people outside of the U.S. and Europe, including researchers new to perennial grains. We will try to accommodate as many researchers as we can and will follow-up with invitation requests as is possible.

Contact: The best way to be in touch is through the RSVP form emailed to you by Tim and Seig, but you can also message perennial2025@landinstitute.org for other needs.

Location

CIMMYT headquarters is located at Km 45 Carretera Mexico-Veracruz, El Batan, Texcoco, State of Mexico, about 45 minutes from the Mexico City airport, and about five minutes from the Netzahuacoyotl statue in Texcoco

FAQ

CIMMYT weather
Texcoco is situated 2,200 m/7, 575 ft above the sea level. Average temperatures range from a low of 51°F to a high of 77°F. The rainy season is June-September. Dress is informal. A sweater and/or jacket for evenings are usually required. An umbrella or light raincoat may be useful.
Venue of the event
The venue of the meetings will take place at the auditorium of CIMMYT headquarters (Tuesday to Thursday). Lunch will be served in the barbecue area during the event from Tuesday to Thursday.
Upon arrival at Mexico

Health Requirements: Mexico has no special vaccination requirements for entry.

On arrival-Immigration and Customs: Bring Doctor’s prescriptions on letterhead for all medications that you have in your luggage other than aspirin or “over the counter” products. Make sure you have well in advance the phytosanitary permits for Mexico in case you are bringing seed, culture, plants, soil or other materials.

Safety measures: A negative COVID-19 test is not required upon entry to the country. However, travelers arriving via air and land borders as well as aircrew members may be subject to health screenings including temperature checks. Those exhibiting symptoms may be subject to additional health screening and/or quarantine.

Immigration and Customs

Kindly note that in the migration review filter, the visitors must present:

  • Passport or current identity and travel document that is valid under international law.
  • The immigration authority may request the foreign person to verify the reason for their trip, through any of the following documents:
  • Hotel reservation
  • Return tickets (itinerary)
  • Letter of invitation
Accommodation and shuttle service

Accommodation will be arranged for all participants either in CIMMYT facilities and in Texcoco available hotels.

A shuttle service will be offered at each hotel in the morning to proceed to CIMMYT headquarters to attend the conference, as well as transportation will be facilitated to return to Texcoco hotels in the late afternoon.

Confirmed shuttle schedules will be informed in advance.