Khumal-18: The first iron enriched bio-fortified rice variety in Nepal

By

 Nepal is considered the center of diversity for rice; however, the country’s rice research is steady and still struggling to release consumer-driven high-yielding rice varieties for different agro-ecological regions. Till today, not a single bio-fortified or nutrient-rich rice variety has been released or registered. A few wheat varieties like Zinc Gahu-1, Zinc Gahu-2, and Khumal Shakti, and a few maize varieties such as Posilo Makai-1 and Posilo Makai-2 have been released, but they are introduced varieties. Thus, Nepal’s government faces challenges to feed the nation with its own nutrient-rich varieties.

Fig. 1. Khumal 18 rice grain and seed

A rice variety named Khumal-18 (NR11105-B-B-27) was released by Nepal’s government, which was passed through the National Seed Board in 2082/3/11. This variety is enriched with iron, a nutrient that is an essential component of hemoglobin. Khumal-18 possesses 2.38 to 2.40 mg/100 g of iron in polished rice than the check variety Khumal-4 (1.2 to 1.3 mg/100 g). However, brown rice of Khumal-18 possesses>5.93 mg/100 g of iron. Similarly, the zinc content in brown rice is 2.67 mg/100 g. The World Health Organization (WHO) and, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) target>9 mg of iron per kg of rice for polished grains. The organization says bio-fortified rice should provide > 30% of the estimated average requirement for iron per day for the target population. An adult man needs nearly 8 mg of iron per day. Thus, according to FAO/WHO, rice should possess 2.4 mg/100g iron to be biofortified. The HarvestPlus Program, a leading global bio-fortification initiative, sets its minimum standard at > 13 mg/kg iron in polished rice to deliver meaningful impacts. India’s ICAR defines bio-fortified rice as > 10 mg/kg iron in polished rice. IRRI’s high iron rice variety delivers 13-15 mg/kg in polished rice. Because the rice variety Khumal-18 meets national, international certification, and local standards, this is the 1st iron-enriched bio-fortified rice variety in Nepal. The rice variety Khumal-18 has a plant height of 132 cm, matures in 145 days, and yields an average of 5.2 metric tons/ha in irrigated conditions. On average, it bears 11 effective tillers/hill and has a 1000-grain weight of 18.6 g. It has a milling recovery of >70% and a head rice recovery 49%. This is fine, improved variety, and is a cross of IR64 and a Nepalese local landrace Patle. This rice variety is recommended for mid hills (750-1550 meters above mean sea level). The lead scientist of Khumal-18, Dr. Ujjawal Kr. S. Kushwaha said that with the cultivation of Khumal-18, malnutrition in the country would drastically decrease. He added that the variety also opens new doors to business. This rice is developed from the National Plant Breeding and Genetics Research Centre-NARC, Khumaltar, Lalitpur, Nepal.  

Fig. 2. Khumal-18 plant in the field

Keywords: biofortified rice, iron-enriched rice, Khumal rice, Nepal's rice variety, Khumal-18, Khumal 18, Khumal18, improved rice in Nepal,

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Understanding transgenics application

By
Image
Introduction The crops that are developed through genetic engineering techniques are called transgenic crops. Transgenic crops are popularly known as transgenics or genetically modified (GM) crops. In transgenics, the target gene of one organism is inserted into a crop to obtain a desirable change in its physiology. The first transgenic crop was developed in cotton and commercialized as Bt cotton. The transgenic era started with the insertion of a soil bacterium,  Bacillus thuringenesis gene into a cotton genotype, which showed resistance to the devastating cotton insect Helicoverpa armigera. The use of genetic engineering techniques in plant science has revolutionized agriculture, and it has shifted to a new era. Earlier, about three decades ago, it was not possible to sequence genes and understand the biochemical and genetic mechanisms of action of genes, but now everybody is familiar with genetic tools and techniques. It is now possible to sequence genes and understand the pr...
Read more

EVALUATION OF LENTIL GERMPLASM FOR RESISTANCE TO WILT, RUST AND STRMPHYLIUM BLIGHT

By
Introduction Lentils are considered to be one of the oldest food crops of mankind that   researchers have traced back to 7000-8000 BC (Hawtin, et al. , 1980; Cubero, 1981; Lev- Yadun et al., 2000). Worldwide, lentil is grown on a total area of 1.8 million hectares, of which 60% is in the South Asian region which includes the lentil producing countries of Bangladesh, Burma, India, Nepal and Pakistan (Nazir et al., 1994). High protein content, starch, low level of antinutrients and ability to grow in water stress conditions are main attributes that make lentil an important crop (Anonymous, 2003). Morphological characterization is the first step in the classification and description of any crop germplasm (Ghafoor et al., 2001; Upadhyaya et al., 2001). Use of botanical descriptors for genotyping has advantages and disadvantages (Ramanatha & Riley, 1994; Watanabe et al., 1995). Among biochemical techniques, seed proteins and isozymes are pr...
Read more

MOLECULAR CHARACTERIZATION OF LENTIL GERMPLASM

By
INTRODUCTION Lentil ( Lens culinaris Medik.) is an important cool-season crop in North Africa, West Asia, the Middle East, the Indian Subcontinent and North America (Erskine 1996). Lentils are an old world legume and were probably one of the first plant species to be domesticated (Bahl et al ., 1993).   Cultivated lentil ( Lens culinaris Medik) is thought to have originated in the Fertile Crescent of the Mediterranean region in Western Asia, dating back to the beginnings of agriculture, from where it spread to the rest of world (Ladizinsky, 1979; Duke, 1981). Lentil is unique because it can be grown in marginal environments in which other crops cannot be cultivated (Cubero, 1981). It is one of the oldest food crops of mankind that researchers have traced back to 7000 - 8000 BC and probably originated from fertile crescent from where it spread to adjacent regions of west Asia and Africa and later to Europe and north America (Hawtin et ...
Read more

ORIGIN OF WHEAT AND ITS INTRODUCTION IN NEPAL

By
INTRODUCTION Scientific Classification Kingdom: Plantae (unranked): Angiosperms (unranked): Monocots (unranked): Commelinids Order: Poales Family: Poaceae Subfamily: Pooideae Tribe: Triticeae Genus: Triticum Botanical Name: Triticum sp. Common Name: Wheat, gehun Wheat is etymologically the ‘ white ’ grain . The word comes from prehis to ric Germanic khva it jaz (German weizen , Dutch weit , Swedish hvete , and Danish hvede ), which was derived from a variant of the base khwīt , source of English white . It alludes to the ‘white’ flour produced by grinding the grain . Wheat     ( Triticum spp. ) is a grass , originally from the Fertile Crescent region of the Near East , but now cultivated worldwide (Belderok et al., 2000). There are many kinds of wheat in the world today. The two most common are common wheat, Triticum aestivum , also known as bread wheat and accounting for some ...
Read more

DNA is a Packet of Memory

By
Image
 It is a profound and perceptive metaphor to describe DNA as "a packet of memory," encapsulating its fundamental role as the "biological information storage system of life." The entire set of instructions required to create, function, care for, and procreate an organism is stored in its DNA. This comprises regulatory instructions for when and where to build proteins, the blueprints for all proteins (the cell's workhorses), and crucial structural components. A four-letter chemical alphabet (A, T, C, and G, which stand for nucleotides) is used to store the data digitally. Certain combinations of these letters create "words" (codons) that serve as regulatory signals, indicating which amino acid should be used in the construction of a protein. Hereditary traits are transferred from parents to children via DNA. It contains the collective or generational "memory" of traits and evolutionary adaptations that a species has developed over millions...
Read more