BHUBANESWAR: Several heat-tolerant and short-duration pulse varieties, currently under crop trials in Odisha, have shown promise of high yield and stronger resilience to rising agro-climatic challenges.
A high-level team from the Odisha State Seeds Corporation (OSSC) and the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) visited trial plots under the ICRISAT seed systems programme at the state government agriculture farm in Pipili on Monday to assess the performance of new pulse varieties.
The team reviewed two pigeon pea varieties, ICPV 25444 and ICPL-22110, currently being tested under Odisha’s agro-climatic conditions. ICPV 25444 has demonstrated robust growth and notable tolerance to high temperatures of up to 45 degree Celsius during flowering and pod formation, indicating stable yield under heat stress.
Meanwhile, ICPL-22110, a short-duration variety with a maturity period of around 90 days, is performing well and is presently in the flowering stage after being sown in mid-February, said Chakradhar Panda, consultant-cum-project coordinator, seed systems, ICRISAT.
In addition to pigeon pea, traditional landraces of green gram and black gram also showed impressive results in the trial fields. These varieties exhibited strong resistance to yellow mosaic virus (YMV), even in the presence of infected crops nearby.
Officials said three landraces each of green gram and black gram are in advanced stages of release through the Landrace Varietal Release Committee (LVRC), a regulatory body tasked with identifying, evaluating and officially releasing local traditional crop varieties for wider cultivation across the state. Agriculture experts noted that the successful performance of these climate-resilient and short-duration pulse varieties could significantly boost pulse production in the state.