The Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) has developed 25 new crop varieties.
The list of crops developed by the KAU includes five varieties of rice; five of cocoa; two each of sugarcane, garcinea, seedless watermelon and cucumber; one variety each of jackfruit, chilli, mushroom, cowpea, ashgourd, brinjal and tomato.
The State Variety Release Committee has approved the list of crops for release.
The panel meeting at Thiruvananthapuram on April 25 under the chairmanship of Agricultural Production Commissioner was attended by KAU officials, Director of Agriculture, a representative of National Seed Corporation and representatives of farmers.
KAU Vice Chancellor P. Rajendran said the new varieties approved for release reflected the university’s commitment to farming community and consistent research output.
“The main characteristics of these varieties are resistance and tolerance to abiotic stresses, which has been developed through focused research. Some of them are F1 hybrids, which represents our new initiative to develop F1 Hybrids of various crops. These varieties will play key roles in agricultural development of the State,” he said.
T.R. Gopalakrishnan, Director of Research, said the release of twenty five varieties was a landmark achievement by the university.
“With this the total number of crop varieties developed by the KAU has reached 308. The very fact that the development of a variety takes five to seven years explains the effort and value of a new one. Many of the new varieties are ideal for the new farming patterns and will be very important,” he said.