An estimate on the adoption of ICAR-IIRR released varieties and their impact on rice production in India during 2015-20
Nirmala Bandumula*, Subba Rao LV, Sundaram RM, Muthuraman P, Swamy AVSR, Abdul Fiyaz R, Chiranjeevi M and Chaitanya U
ICAR-Indian Institute of Rice Research, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad-500030.
*Corresponding author (Email: bnirmaladrr@gmail.com)
Received: 10th October 2020; Accepted: 22nd December 2020
Abstract
Rice is the most important food crop of India. ICAR-Indian Institute of Rice Research (ICAR-IIRR) was established in 1965 as All India Coordinated Rice Improvement Project (AICRIP) and has been playing a key role in the improvement of rice technologies. Extensive testing under the All India Coordinated Rice Improvement Project, which is one of the largest networks for evaluation of any single crop in India, has contributed to the release of 1375 rice varieties including 117 hybrids for all the major rice growing ecosystems of the country during the last five and half decades (1965-2020). Of the 1375 varieties released, about 267 varieties are still in the breeder seed production (BSP) chain. In the present study, an estimate was made on the area covered by the varieties released by ICAR-IIRR and their contribution to the rice production in India during 2015-16 to 2019-20. It was estimated that, annually, the ICAR-IIRR varieties contribute to about 8 % of the total production of rice in the country. The revenue impact of ICAR-IIRR varieties is estimated at 3161 Million USD annually, which is in the form of gross returns from cultivation.