ICAR-Central Tuber Crops Research Institute (CTCRI) has come out with six new tuber crop varieties for release. Two cassava varieties with excellent culinary qualities and less nutrient demanding will be released for Kerala state. Their NPK requirements are only 25 percent of the present recommendation and hence are ideal for agroecology-based, nature positive farming. The arrowroot variety with high rhizome yield (30 tons/hectare) and starch (5.95 tons/hectare) recommended for release in Kerala will be the first variety of arrowroot in our country. Two sweet potato hybrids are ready for release. SPH-52, a biofortified sweet potato hybrid with 24.64 tons/hectare yield and 8.57-11.4 mg/100g beta-catotene; and SPH-60, another sweet potato hybrid with 26.18 tons/hectare yield.
YBH 9×10, with average yield of 24.66 tons/hectare, is a yam bean variety recommended for release in Odisha state. It is also heartening to note that CTCRI has developed five new cassava hybrids with excellent culinary qualities and they will be tested for performance under five different agro ecological units in Kerala before release. Research has been intensified to improve the nutritional quality of tubers through biofortification and one sweet potato, SP-95/4 (high yield – 19 tons/hectare, short duration-75-80 days and high beta-carotene- 8.5 mg/100 g) and two taro (CE-558: high in zinc- 10.57 mg/100g and another one, CE-334357: high in iron- 12.5 mg/100g) are recommended for multilocation trials before release. The institute has identified seven lines with superior traits for germplasm registration following Government of India guidelines. They are three cassava lines, CR 43-8 and W-19, two N use efficient lines and CI-906, a NPK use efficient line; and four sweet potato lines, S27- suitable for processing and SB21/57, 84×1 and Dhenkanal local 2, three drought tolerant lines. Sixteen gene sequences for different traits were identified and deposited with National Centre for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), US National Library of Medicine, USA. Six crop management technologies are recommended by IRC for validation in multi-environment trials under AICRPTC, Institute programmes, through KVKs etc. They are (i) protray nursery production by 20 g microsett in greater yam, (ii) vegetables intercropping in taro (iii) INM in tropical tuber crops (sweet potato, elephant foot yam, greater yam, taro and yam bean), (iv) management strategies for mealybugs, (v) three biocapsules and (vi) management of postharvest rot in elephant foot yam for culinary purpose. The Institute also recommended eight technologies for certification by ICAR. They are (i) high sensitivity LAMP technique for detection of Sri Lankan Cassava Mosaic Virus (SLCMV) infection in cassava, (ii) cassava and sweet potato resistant starch – RS4 type (chemically modified), (iii) continuous type cassava peeler for small scale processing, (iv) beta-carotene and anthocyanin rich low-fat sweet potato vacuum fried chips, (v) sweet potato + pearl millet choco filled cookies, (vi) satellite incubation centre: a value chain focused grassroot entrepreneurship model, (vii) rainbow diet campaign model for scaling up biofortified tuber crops varieties and (viii) seed villages for Chinese potato in Tamil Nadu.
It has also been decided to file patent application for two technologies, (i) customized hydroponic nutrient solution for sweet potato and other crops and (ii) design patent for a portable self-propelled cassava sett cutter and copy right application filing for the algorithm used in the machine vision based sweet potato grader. Institute organized golden jubilee Annual Institute Research Council (IRC) meeting during 10-13 June 2024 and approved above recommendations.
Read more: https://www.ctcri.org/events.html#tcsv
