Tree species are indispensable to support human life. Due to their long
life cycle and environmental sensitivity, breeding trees to suit
day-to-day human needs is a formidable challenge. Whether they are
edible or industrial crops, improving yield under optimal, sub-optimal
and marginal areas calls for uni?ed efforts from the s-
entistsaroundtheworld. Whiletheuniquenessofcoconutaskalpavriksha(Sanskr-
meaning tree-of-life) marks its presence in every continent from Far
East to South America, tree crops like cocoa, oil palm, rubber, apple,
peach, grapes and walnut prove their environmental sensitivity towards
tropical, sub-tropical and temperate climates. Desert climate is
quintessential for date palm. Thus, from soft drinks to breweries to
beverages to oil to tyres, the value addition offers a spectrum of pr-
ucts to human kind, enriched with nutritional, environmental, ?nancial,
social and trade related attributes. Taxonomically, tree crops do not
con?ne to a few families, but spread across a section of genera, an
attribute so unique that contributes immensely to genetic biodiversity
even while cultivated at the commercial scale. Many of these species
in?uence other ?ora to nurture in their vicinity, thus ensuring their
integrity in p- serving the genetic biodiversity. While wheat, rice,
maize, barley, soybean, cassava andbananamakeup themajorfoodstaples,
manyfruittreespeciescontributegreatly tonutritionalenrichment
inhumandiet. Theediblepartofthesespeciesisthesource of several nutrients
that makes additives for the daily diet of humans, for example,
vitamins, sugars, aromas and ?avour compounds, and raw material for food
proce- ing industries. Tree crops face an array of agronomic and
horticultural problems in propagation, yield, appearance, quality,
diseases and pest control, abiotic stresses and poor shelf-life
