Selçuk University aims to make the characterization and improvement of pastures belonging to Konya Region would be realized by field and cultivation studies. Currently, the pastures are seen very poor in point of feeding and need agricultural and economical improvements too. In this meaning, we target perennial forage shrubs which can increase whole farm profit, and provides multiple environmental benefits. So, we aim specifically to cultivate five bushy taxa peculiar to our region. In this context we can gladly cooperate with especially the countries of Southern Europe.The province of Konya is located in the west of a plateau of about 40 000 square kilometers, known as the Great Konya Basin because it is surrounded by mountains.However, the capacity of productivity in this area is fairly low and there needs to be improved. For this target, perennial shrubs are more sustainable rather than compete with cropping. It is also important to know that perennial shrubs will boost whole-farm profit even when grain prices increase. Economic analysis reveals that grain prices have a predictably large effect on farm profit, yet optimization of whole-farm profit is always achieved with perennial forage shrubs. This is still the case in years with high grain prices. And critically, the optimal area of a farm established with shrubs does not change with grain prices, because the shrubs are best placed in marginal cropping areas (i.e. where cropping input costs are higher or grain yields are lower). The first way forage shrubs boost whole-farm profit is by reducing the amount of supplementary feed required. Supplementary feeding has a direct cost, can be expensive, and generally has an indirect labor cost. Economic modelling reveals that in a ‘typical central wheat belt’ farm, forage shrubs at about 10 per cent of the farm area can boost farm profit by 15–20 per cent. Accounting for just more than half of the profit increase, the second important key way forage shrubs boost whole-farm profit is by allowing producers to defer grazing of annual pastures during early winter. These points highlight why it is important to evaluate the economic potential of forage shrubs on a whole farm basis. During to the project searches, field expeditions would be carried out and finally one sampled area would be choose for cultivation and remediation studies. By analysing the profitability of the project outputs, the advantages would be revealed in comparison with current situation. Following we aim to amply the targeted taxa for cultivation via in vivo and vitro approaches. Therefore, Forage shrubs should be part of a mixture in the pastures. This means we are interested in adding forage shrubs to the feedbase, not replacing existing components. The targeted taxa can be ordered as Kochia prostrate, Colutea arborescens, Genista involucrate, Krascheninnikkowia ceratoides, Satureja cuneifolia and Hedysarum anatolicum, respectively.

Konya is the biggest city and in the center of Turkey while has around 1/3 (38%) seed production with 125 foundations, 375 dealers, 6500 seed producers on 65.000 ha area for certified seed variety production. Selcuk University* has 95.000 students, 6 institutes, 24 Faculties, 5 high schools, 22 vocational schools, technopark, advanced technology research and application center, 3500 academic staff and 1300 administrative staff.