New varieties of Basmati by ICAR

New varieties of Basmati by ICAR

Context: The Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) organised the ‘Kisan Sampark Yatra’ during September 27-29 in the rice growing region of Haryana and Punjab to obtain farmers’ feedback on the three newly released IARI Basmati varieties.

Concept:

• Basmati rice is an export commodity with annual forex earning of Rs. 25,053 crores during 2021-22.
• Pusa Basmati rice varieties namely, Pusa Basmati 1121, Pusa Basmati 1509 and Pusa Basmati 6 occupy more than 90% of the area under Basmati rice cultivation in GI area of Basmati rice in India and account for more than 90% of the Basmati rice exports from India.

Issues in basmati cultivation:

• Bacterial blight and blast are the most devastating diseases in Basmati rice which cause significant yield losses as well as affect the Basmati grain and cooking quality. Conventionally, these diseases are managed by use of chemicals like streptocyclin and tricyclazole.
• During recent years, European Union has reduced the MRL (residue limit) of tricyclazole (one of the most commonly used fungicide in managing neck blast disease) to 0.01ppm. 
• Therefore, there was an urgent need to address this issue in order to maintain the leading position in the international trade of Basmati rice.

ICAR new variety as a solution:

• ICAR pioneered the research to incorporate resistance to the two diseases through incorporation of genes governing resistance to bacterial blight and blast diseases in the genetic background of the three major varieties.
• Pusa Basmati 1847, Pusa Basmati 1885, Pusa Basmati 1886 an improved Bacterial blight and blast resistant version of  Pusa Basmati 1509 , Pusa Basmati 112, Pusa Basmati 6,with inbuilt resistance to bacterial blight and blast disease developed through molecular marker assisted breeding respectively.
• These variety possesses two genes each for bacterial blight resistance namely xa13 and Xa21 and blast resistance namely Pi54 and Pi2.