Plant Breeding Under Environmental Uncertainty: A Systematic Review of Challenges in a Changing Climate

Abstract

Plant breeding strategies play a crucial role in ensuring the global food security, particularly in the face of increasing environmental variability. However, complex, ever‐changing environmental impacts are increasingly limiting the effectiveness and predictability of breeding programs. This review systematically brings together available information on how important environmental factors, including climate change, extreme temperatures, drought, salinity, and changes in pest and disease prevalence, affect plant breeding. These variables present multidimensional problems in breeding activities. This review thoroughly evaluates the role of genotype‐by‐environment (G × E) interactions, reduced heritability in stress, and unfavorable environmental changes in identifying and selecting superior genotypes. It also elaborates on the consequences of these problems in traditional breeding practices, molecular breeding, and genomic selection. The potential solutions include emerging technologies and integrated breeding approaches that combine envirotyping with genomic prediction, environmental modeling, and phenomics to enhance the selection of climate‐resilient traits. By documenting evidence in a wide range of agroecological situations, this review provides a broader framework of knowledge on environmental limitations in breeding efficiency and suggests adaptive pathways to future crop improvement programs. This review supports the urgent need to implement eco‐conscious breeding to enhance genetic benefits in both favorable and stressful environments, which will lead to sustainability and robustness in agricultural systems.