New chickpea variety released in Tajikistan

August 15, 2011 at 6:19 am | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Tajikistan-ICARDA research team at seed multiplication field of chickpea variety Sino

Sino, a new chickpea variety developed jointly by the Institute of Crop Husbandry (ICH) in Tajikistan, the Tajik Academy of Agricultural Sciences and ICARDA, has been released for cultivation by Tajikistan’s State Variety Testing Commission. In three seasons of yield trials in Tajikistan, Sino yielded an average of 1.7 t/ha under rainfed conditions, significantly higher than the standard control variety. It has large seeds: 1000-grain weight of 370 g, compared to 200 g for the local variety Muktadir. Sino is suitable for planting in winter as well as in spring; resistant to ascochyta blight disease; and can be used for both food and feed (e.g. in feed concentrates for livestock and poultry).

Sino was developed at Tel Hadya as ICARDA line FLIP 97-149. It was tested for several years, first by ICH and then by the State Variety Testing Commission, before being released in 2011. The new variety is already being grown by farmers in several districts. Following the official release, ICARDA is working with ICH on seed multiplication and out-scaling. The team of breeders include C. Imomov, T. Bukhoriev and P. Zuhurov from ICH and Dr Rajinder Malhotra of ICARDA.