Hybrid seeds revolutionise agriculture

Bangladesh against all odds has achieved a near miracle in crop production. Despite being a relatively small country with decreasing arable agricultural land–due to increasing demand for residential and industrial use, crop production has increased steadily. While food and nutrition security in its fullest sense is yet to be achieved, major progress has been made.

One of the crucial factors behind this welcome phenomenon is the inroads hybrid seeds made on farming in the recent years. Quality seeds ensure quality crops. Hybrid seeds also ensure increased quantity. A report published in this newspaper on Saturday stated that as a sequel of hybrid seed cultivation, farmers are harvesting two to three times more than what local varieties yielded.

Hybrid seeds, sometimes referred to as F1 Hybrid, is a cross between two different varieties that is designed to generate specific traits within the plants. Once the cross-pollinated occurs the seed is collected from the current season’s crop. These seeds, known as first-generation seeds or F1 for short, are planted the following season to produce a crop with the desired characteristics.

In the last five years, hybrid rice seed cultivation doubled in the country, with 13 per cent of land currently under crossbred farming which is increasing gradually. In Fiscal Year 2020-21, farmers brought 15,11,200 hectares of land under an improved variety of rice production. On the other hand, in FY 2015-16, the number of farming encompassed only 8,11,000 hectares of land. This indeed is an impressive achievement.

Loss of arable land means that the same fields must produce more for consumption and trade. Hence, hybrid seeds are integral to increasing modern crop production, especially in a country like Bangladesh. These seeds are produced by cross pollinated plants. Providing farmers with new high-yielding and hybrid seed varieties is an important part of agricultural development. These seeds are helping the farmers generate higher crop yields and overcome the constant barrage of plant pests, natural calamities, and disease that are the enemies of agriculture. It is good to note that a huge number farmers in the country have access to these good quality hybrid seeds, which has revolutionised food production. The adoption of best quality hybrids is also important because the weather patterns are changing and farmers need seeds that can cope with the changing weather conditions and provide much-needed economic benefits to the farmers

As a matter of fact Bangladesh started rather late in cultivating hybrid rice. In the 1990s when the government provided policy support to private seed companies in Bangladesh to go for hybrid rice seed imports, it earned the government lots of criticism. Fast forward to 2021, Bangladesh is growing an extra one million tons of rice – in most conservative estimates – from hybrid rice varieties each year.

Experiments in development of hybrid food and cash crop seeds are gathering pace. Agencies, tasked with agricultural research and research wings of agricultural universities, too, are now working more extensively in this area. And, in most cases, the results have been very encouraging. After initial hesitancy the farmers have also taken to hybrid seeds in a big way.

Developing high-yield hybrid seeds of sunflower is the need of the hour to boost domestic production of edible oil-producing crops and, thereby, cut foreign exchange spending on imports of edible oil. Perhaps the most unnoticed hybrid seed development stories can be found in fruits and vegetable sub-sector of crops. Over the years a lot of hybrid vegetable seeds have been introduced.

However, there are challenges as well. Poor quality seeds, inadequate research to invent good variety of seed and lack of awareness campaign among the farmers are the core challenges to making hybrid crops even more popular among the farmers.

The introduction of hybrid seeds has transformed the landscape of agriculture in Bangladesh. It has enabled even the small landholding farmers to wriggle out of poverty. The success of hybrid technology in any crop, depends on yield advantage over open pollinated varieties and production as well as marketing feasibility. The government may consider allocating additional money in the agricultural budgets to incentivise production and marketing of hybrid seeds. Policy support is needed to make available hybrid seed at affordable price and in time.