Breeding and deploying climate resilient maize varieties in the tropics Prasanna B.M.* Director, Global Maize Program, CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center) & CGIAR Plant Health Initiative Lead *E-mail: b.m.prasanna@cgiar.org
Online Published on 15 February, 2024. Abstract Building climate resilience in the smallholder farming systems warrants implementation of an intenisve multi-disciplinary and multiinstitutional strategy, including deployment of genetic inovations and sustainable agronomic practices, together with enabling policies. Experiences of CIMMYT over the past 15-20 years in the Global South demonstrate that accelerated breeding and delivery of climate resilient maize varieties in the tropics is possible through: (a) carefully undertaken field-based phenotyping both on-station and on-farm in the target population of environments; (b) utilization of modern breeding tools/strategies, including doubled haploid (DH) technology, precision phenotyping, breeder-ready marker deployment, and genomic selection, to achieve rapid breeding cycles and development of improved products; (c) multi-institutional efforts, especially public-private alliances, to ensure that the climate resilient varieties effectively reach the farming communities. In the last 15 years, CIMMYT and partners in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia have released more than 300 climateresilient maize varieties, including drought and heat tolerance, disease resistance, and other farmer-preferred traits. In Sub-Saharan Africa, more than 181,000 tons of certified seed of CGIAR-related multiple stress-tolerant maize varieties were produced in 2022, and commercialized by over 100 seed companies, covering an estimated 7.5 million hectares. Scaling of high-yielding, and drought and heat tolerant maize varieties is the need of the hour in the tropics of South Asia, following the example of sub-Saharan Africa. It must also be recognized that the changing climate is one of the major factors for the increasing incidence of devastating transboundary pests and diseases, especially in the tropics. Therefore, intenisve deployment of improved varietes with host plant resistance, as a part of integrated pest and disease management strategies, is important for sustainably protecting maize crops, and protect food security and livelihoods of millions of smallholder farmers. Top Keywords Maize, Climate resilient, Tropics, Agri-food systems, Pathogens and insect-pests. Top |