Abstract
Fruit production is presently facing a number of new challenges which may endanger its performance. A deep renewal of pratices have to be engaged, involving a large set of competences from geneticists, breeders, agronomists, pathologists, physiologisits, modelers, as well as socio-economists and grower and chain supply representatives. In particular, new varietal ideotypes must be designed through a global approach that considers the variety in its environment, submitted to various manipulations, practices and treatments, all these factors interacting in a complex network that must be optimised for finding innovative answers to the current economical and environmental challenges. In this paper, we attempt to highlight key ideas and concepts that underline our researches at INRA and that aim to facing the three levels of complexity that must be taken into account for designing new ideotypes: (i) combine desirable alleles at different genes for each target trait; (ii) combine the different traits despite possible antagonisms (iii) find positive synergies between genetic potential, environmental effects and cultural practices.