The Hindu Business Line : Hybrid rice seeds: More popular with farmers in backward regions

Contrary to expectations, it is not the `progressive' farmers of the established Green Revolution areas who are demonstrating true appetite for hybrid rice technology.

According to industry sources, of the 12,000 tonnes of hybrid rice seeds that were sold in the current kharif season, Uttar Pradesh would have accounted for some 4,500 tonnes. And even here, it is not the developed western part, but the `backward' central and eastern districts of Kanpur, Lucknow, Barabanki, Varanasi and Gorakhpur that have provided the major market. Farmers in Bihar, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh have consumed another 3,500 tonnes.

On the other hand, the combined market size of Punjab and Haryana is currently said to be less than 2,500 tonnes, with Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh accounting for the remaining 1,500 tonnes. Thus, unlike the earlier high yielding varietal (HYV) technology originally confined to Punjab, Haryana, coastal Andhra and Tamil Nadu, the new hybrid rice technology is being lapped up more by farmers of agriculturally less-prosperous States.

How different

How is hybrid rice different from HYVs? Hybrid technology basically exploits a phenomenon known as `heterosis' - the tendency of a first - generation progeny of two genetically dissimilar plants to exhibit qualities superior to either parents by combining their individual favourable traits.

While developing hybrids is relatively easy in cotton, vegetables, bajra and other `open pollinated' crops, it is not so for rice and wheat, which are naturally `self-pollinating' plants.

The individual flowers in these contain both the female (pistil) and male (stamen) reproductive organs.

In-bred varieties

That leaves little scope for the egg cells in the pistil of one plant to be fertilised by the pollen (male cells) discharged from the stamen of another plant.

Hybridisation involves making one of the two in-bred varieties `male sterile' and receptive to cross-pollination. But that is easier said because the pollen flow and floret opening durations have to be synchronised alongside maintaining optimal temperature and humidity conditions.

"We have gradually raised our hybrid seed production yields from 300 kg to 700 kg per acre, but we are still below the 1.2 tonne levels of China," admitted Mr Mahesh Girdhar, Head, Bayer BioScience India.

Farmers in the Samalkha-Panipat belt of Haryana say that they have been able to harvest paddy yields of 36-38 quintals per acre from planting the `Arize-6444' hybrid developed by Bayer. This is as against 24-26 quintals from existing HYVs, such as HKR-126.

"Earlier, I was using my own seeds saved from the previous year's crop, whereas now I have to invest Rs 800 per acre for buying their seeds. But then, I am getting more paddy and extra income of Rs 2,500," Mr Randhir Sandhu, a 44-acre grower of Gwalera village, told Business Line.

Many farmers have also reported lower urea consumption. "I was applying four bags (50 kg each) of urea per acre. Now I use only two bags and still get higher yields," said Mr Inder Singh of Mehrana village.