Abstract

The exponential growth of the human population and increasing climatic change are major challenges to global agriculture because of the need for sustainable food production to feed the growing population. Plant breeding plays a significant role in resolving agricultural problems and enhancing both the production and productivity of the growing population. Breeding new and high-performing cultivars with market-preferring traits takes more than 10 years in the absence of an integrated pre-breeding program. During the early phases of breeding, a significant amount of time, space and resources are invested in the selection and genetic advancement stages after initial crosses are performed with parental genotypes. Speed breeding has the potential to reduce the time required for cultivar development, release and commercialization. Crop improvement in light of the rapidly changing climate and increasing human population continues to be one of the primary concerns for researchers across the globe. The rate at which current crop improvement programs are progressing is essentially inadequate to meet food demand. There is an urgent need for redesigning crops for climate resilience and sustainable yield and nutrition. The rate of crop improvement is largely impeded owing to the long generation time required by crop plants during the breeding process. As a solution in this direction, speed breeding is now being practiced at a large scale to reduce generation time to accommodate multiple generations of crops per year. To enhance the efficiency of breeding, researchers are now adopting an integrated approach in which speed breeding is used along with modern plant breeding and genetic engineering technologies. In the present review, we have summarized the technological aspects, opportunities, and limitations associated with speed breeding. The application of speed breeding, such as mapping population development, haplotype-based breeding, transgenic breeding, and genome-edited line advancement, has also been discussed. Speed breeding is a promising technology that expedites the goals of food and industrial crop improvement by reducing the number of breeding cycles for establishing nutritional security and sustainable agriculture. It is possible to reduce the amount of time needed for developing, promoting, and commercialize cultivars through speed breeding. Ultimately, the rate at which current crop enhancement programs are moving forward is not keeping up with the need for food. Redesigning crops is crucial for long-term productivity and nutrition, as well as climate resistance. The length of time crop plants need to generate throughout the breeding process greatly slows down agricultural progress