Abstract: The present invention relates to a transgenic plant having increased tolerance to an abiotic stress, including freeze stress, cold stress, heat stress, salt stress, drought stress, osmotic stress, water stress, oxidative stress and/or ionic, wherein the transgenic plant is transformed with a nucleic acid sequence encoding a WHy protein comprising SEQ ID NO:2. The invention further relates to a method for obtaining a transgenic plant having increased tolerance to an abiotic stress, comprising transforming a plant with a nucleic acid sequence encoding the WHy protein. The present invention also relates to vegetative tissue from the transgenic plant of the invention or produced according to the method of the invention and to seeds containing a nucleic acid sequence encoding the WHy protein.