After completing successful farm trials, 12 new crop varieties - including rice, coconut, tomato and pepper - developed by Kerala Agricultural University (KAU), have been recommended for release to farmers.
The clearance was given by the State Committee on Release of Crop Varieties and Seeds recently.
The crops also include snake gourd, chilli, ginger, asoka, fodder cowpea and rice bean.
Two varieties each of tomato and pepper will also be released to farmers, according to a KAU press note.
The rice variety ‘Ezhome-3’, developed at Padannakkad Agricultural College, is meant for cultivation in Kaippad tracts of northern Malabar.
It was found to be tolerant to salinity with an average yield of 4.3 tonne per hectare.
‘Keramadhura’, a green dwarf coconut variety noted for tender nuts, was developed at Regional Agricultural Research Station, Pilicode.
While ‘Panniyur 8i’, a new variety of pepper developed at Pepper Research Station, Panniyur, is tolerant to drought and quick wilt disease, the other variety, ‘Vijay’, developed at College of Horticulture, Vellanikkara, is high-yielding and has large berries.
‘Manulakshmy’, developed by scientists at Agricultural Research Station, Mannuthy, has largest fruit size among the tomato resistant to bacterial wilt. ‘HarithaSree’ is a snake gourd variety for green fruit preferred areas.
‘Akshaya’, another tomato variety; ‘Aswathy’, a variety of ginger and ‘Aswini 1’, a variety of asoka were developed by scientists of College of Horticulture, Vellanikkara.
‘Vellayani Thejus’, a shade-tolerant chilli variety with highly pungent round-shaped fruits; Aiswarya, a variety of fodder cowpea with 18.5 per cent protein content and ‘Surabhi’, a variety of rice bean with protein content of 18.9 per cent were developed at College of Agriculture, Vellayani.
“These are in addition to the 271 varieties of crops developed by KAU till 2011,” KAU Vice-Chancellor P Rajendran said.
According to Kerala Agricultural University Director of Research T R Gopalakrishnan, the new varieties have yielded appreciable results in trials conducted in University farms as well in private fields.
Several more varieties, developed during 2012-13, are undergoing tests and will be recommended to the State Committee on Release only on satisfactory completion of testing process, he said.
The State Committee, headed by the Agricultural Production Commissioner, consists of Kerala Agricultural University Director of Research; KAU Department of Plant Breeding head, Director of Agriculture, Additional Director of Agriculture (Crop Production), a representative of National Seeds Corporation and farmers’ representatives.
