General scenario of the use of geoclimatic, morphological and physiological factors in the analysis of coffee genotypes with tolerance to the impact of drought: a review

Abstract

The worldwide demand for the development of drought-tolerant coffee plants is increasing due to the impacts global climate changes have caused in large and small coffee plantations throughout the world. Thus, the genetic improvement of the coffee plant has become indispensable for the continuity and rentability of this agricultural culture. For this, the coffee genetic improvement programs require morphological and physiological information concerning the plants in their germplasm banks to serve as subsidies for the development of cultivars. The current study aims to emphasize the importance of characterizing the genetic material of the coffee plants in the germplasm banks. By way of a literature review, it considered the impact of drought on some aspects of coffee plant physiology and morphology, and the need for genetic improvement programs to understand their germplasm to use it as a starting point in the development of cultivars that mitigate the production losses caused by drought.