Useful traits in agricultural plants and animals are genetically determined. For most crops, genetic improvement in the last 50 or more years has delivered large gains in productivity and significant improvement in quality of the products. Most of the breeding performed so far has relied on phenotypic evaluation of individuals and families. Progress in biological knowledge and in genetic technology now allows approaches to crop improvement having an increased emphasis on molecular genetics. The genetic fingerprint (the genotype) of an individual can now be determined, and the relationship between the genotype and the phenotypic value of the individual can be established. Therefore, efficient genotyping technologies are going to play an increasing role in future breeding. However, widespread use of current genotyping technologies is limited by their low throughput and high cost. Most research work in the field of genetic molecular markers is intellectually driven by progress made in the biomedical area, building on the availability of the human genome sequence, the outcome of a 15 years - multi billions US $ program. The DNA sequence paradigm however may not be easily applied to agriculture: no single plant or animal species is going to receive the same level of attention and funding as the human species. We believe that the capture of genomics knowledge for the improvement of agricultural species will require a different mindset. We see an opportunity to by-pass the sequencing paradigm and improve useful traits in agricultural species by better knowledge of genomic diversity and better tools to recombine that diversity productively to generate improved individuals with superior characteristics. Efficient genotyping tools play a key role in this strategy.