LAHORE: A Pakistani agriculture research and development company claims to have made a breakthrough in developing wheat hybrid seed with approximately 40 percent more yield potential.

“We had been working on preparing a wheat hybrid variety for some years to ensure food security of the country by getting more grain, using the same agriculture resources. A breakthrough has been achieved with the help of Beijing Academy of Agriculture Sciences as the wheat hybrid developed after four-year long research has the potential of yielding 40 percent more grain than the output of the current varieties,” Shahzad Ali Malik, the chief executive officer of the company tells Dawn here on Monday.

“The new seed variety has been sown at least on 25 acres of land in Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan provinces this season on trial basis in different climatic conditions. It will be ready for commercial sowing after a couple of years and passing through the registration process,” he says.

Mr Malik says the hybrid seed has been developed using local varieties and Chinese hybrid, maintaining all traits of the local wheat grains. Attempts are being made to further increase the yield potential and take it to 100pc more than the yield (30-35 maunds per acre) of the current varieties, he adds.

He says the company has also started research for developing a cotton hybrid variety to bring the growers back to the white lint for meeting requirements of the local textile industry.

Mr Malik’s research company has earlier developed hybrid coarse rice varieties, initially commercialized in Sindh and then introduced in Punjab, having a yield potential of more than double of the non-hybrid varieties.

Replying to a query, he says trials of hybrid Basmati rice varieties are going on, hoping the seeds will be marketed in the 2023-24 season.

Published in Dawn, January 11th, 2022