Ayub Agriculture Research Institute (AARI), has developed a new environmental and human friendly cotton variety FH-113 approved by a high-level committee of agriculture experts for commercial cultivation.
A team of prominent cotton experts headed by Dr Noor-ul-Islam Khan, Director Cotton Research Institute of Ayub Agricultural Research Institute (AARI) Faisalabad developed the new cotton variety.
A spokesman of the AARI told to the APP here on Sunday that efforts were made to cross Bollguard-I introduced Bt. material with local germplasm. The material passed through various inbreeding cycles and selection, which resulted in one promising line coded as FH-113. FH-113 showed relatively promising results in 4 years of different tests including yield adaptability.
He further told that CLCV tolerance, bollworm resistance, fiber traits etc FH-113 has been more useful in low to medium fertile lands confronted with moisture shortage. Salient aspects of FH-113 compared to other existing varieties shows extraordinary qualities and resistance in it against all attacks of pests, he added.
The FH-113 has been developed at Cotton Research Institute, Faisalabad through hybridisation. The cross was attempted in 1998 between non-Bt early maturing germplasm FH-925 with Australian Bt variety Bollguard-I (cry1Ac). The field evaluation of FH-113 was started in 2003-04. After passing through inbreeding cycles, the material coded as FH-113 passed through different stages of yield and other trait testing from 2003-04 to 2009-10.
Referring to the comparative results of FH-113 and CIM-496 under different environmental conditions, he said that it was observed that FH-113 particularly showed more stability in yield under high CLCV environment.
He also revealed that the experiments results of the newly developed variety FH-113 in Sindh & Balochistan, provinces are also proved that this variety have high adaptability in diverse environmental conditions.
The spokesman also disclosed that a special committee of the environment experts has also given a go ahead signal for the cultivation of FH-113 variety as in various laboratory analysis it was proved that the commercial cultivation of this variety is environment friendly and would not cause any pollution or health hazards for the human being.
He pointed out that under the World Trade Organisation (WTO) regime, it is now obligatory that only those varieties are allowed, which are not harmful for the environment and cause pollution and injurious to the human health. "Owing to extraordinary qualities of the newly developed variety, it would fetch more foreign exchange for the country on one hand and on the other hand, it would also reduce a huge amount which was being spent on the pesticides for saving the cotton crops from various diseases," the spokesmen added.