New Wheat Variety helps Farmers in Maharashtra to Double their Yield

IN NEWS

• Recently government’s press release shows that the newly developed common wheat or bread wheat, also called high yielding Aestivum, matures in 110 days and is resistant to most races of leaf and stem rust.

ABOUT

• Wheat variety MACS 6478 recently developed by Scientists from Agharkar Research Institute (ARI), an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, has doubled the crop yield for farmers in Karanjkhop, a village in Maharashtra.
• The farmers of the village in Koregaon tehsil of Satara district in Maharashtra are now getting a yield of 45-60 quintal per hectare with the new variety as against earlier average yield ranging 25-30 quintal per hectare when they cultivated Lok 1, HD 2189 and other old varieties.

WHY UNIQUE?

• The newly developed common wheat or bread wheat, also called high yielding Aestivum, matures in 110 days and is resistant to most races of leaf and stem rust.
• The amber colored medium sized grain contains 14% protein, 44.1 ppm zinc and 42.8 ppm iron which is higher than other cultivated varieties. A research paper on this variety has been published in ‘International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences’.

WAY FORWARD

• With the efforts of a former seed certification officer and support from ARI staff, so far 10 farmers of the village have cultivated this variety on fourteen acres of land. Farmers of Karanjkhop have planned to establish a company for further seed production and other agricultural produce.
• Indian agriculture and farmers needed one spark to get motivated and that is provided by ARI wheat variety MACS 6478. Now, India can look forward in bringing new game changing role in wheat production.