ABSTRACT
Genetics, as we saw in the Introduction, grew out of the practical problem of the improvement of agricultural crops and stock. The development of the subject which followed Mendel's discoveries has not, however, been primarily concerned with practice, but has been towards the formulation of a comprehensive theory and the elucidation of the fundamental biological problems which were raised. This scientific advance has only fairly recently begun to have much effect on breeding practice, and we are still a long way from being able to apply the whole of the theoretical knowledge at our disposal. In the peculiar economic situation in which man has found himself during the last few decades, production, even with little help from science, has been so far ahead of consumption that the application of genetics to this field has, in most countries, not been investigated whole-heartedly and on a large scale. The results which have been obtained are, however, already quite considerable, and we can envisage the possibility of quite startling changes in the world's agricultural economy, particularly in connection with crop plants.
