Srinagar, June 23: To review the performance of ICAR – Indian Institute of Maize Research (IIMR) and All India Coordinated Research Project on Maize (AICRPM) centres, the Quinquennial Review Team (QRT) constituted for the period 2017-21 under the Chairmanship of Dr.B.S.Dhillon ex Vice Chancellor PAU, Ludhiana met at Hyderabad, Ludhiana and Delhi.
All centres made detailed presentations based on their work during the period under review which were followed by intensive discussions. In addition, QRT team made field visits at Hyderabad, Ludhiana, Sabour and Dholi of AICRPM centres and all IIMR stations namely Hyderabad, Ludhiana and Begusarai. The scientist-industry interface meetings were also held at Hyderabad to understand the stakeholders’ needs and get their suggestions for fine tuning the research programmes.
The QRT Ranked the centres across country on parameters like Varietal Development, Entry contribution, impacrt publications, outreach, seed production, collaborations etc and the AICRPM Center Srinagar located under the aegis of SKUAST-K was adjudged as the fourth top ranking regular center across india and first in the northern hill zone. The centre has so far released twenty seven maize composites and hybrids and produced more than 1000q seed of maize in the last five years. Further the center was ranked as number 1 in terms of impact publications along with PAU, Ludhiana.
The recognition at national level for SKUAST-K is a welcome step in the backdrop of the significance of the maize crop in Kashmir where it occupies an area of 0.73 thousand hectares with a production of 1.54 lakh tonnes of grain. The crop is pivotal for food, feed, fodder and nutritional security in the valley and SKUAST-K is striving hard to achieve self-sufficiency in this crop for the valley.
The valley requires 2300-2800 tonnes of maize annually for livestock feed and the total seed requirement for the valley stands at 22183 quintals which can be realized after improving the Seed Replacement Rate through large scale seed production of SKUAST-K bred varieties in collaboration with department of Agriculture and resorting to PPP mode particularly in case of single cross hybrids.
Professor Nazir Ahmed Ganai, Vice Chancellor SKUAST-K congratulated the AICRPM team of SKUAST-K and emphasized on identifying specific niches of maize to cater to the various requirements of the farming community.
