V arious methods have evolved in plant breeding. One of the most important methods is that of selection. T he ability to choose gave birth to the idea of selection. This is the most primitive and by and large the most successful method of plant breeding. Selection as a part of plant breeding started with the domestication of plants by early man.
Domestication refers to the process of bringing wild species under human management.
As human knowledge of agriculture grew, man started shuffling crop species from one geographical terrain to another, thus making new introductions. T he first prerequisite of selection is the availability of variability, i.e. different types of forms. After a variable population is recognized, individuals that are the best performers for the desired feature, say fruit size in the case of tomatoes, are chosen and the rest of the population is discarded or rejected. The progeny of the selected individuals is grown further and again screened for the desired feature. This process is repeated until a uniform plant population is attained which has the best-desired characters.