India
March 1, 2016

XIX Annual Breeder Seed Review Meeting was inaugurated by the chief guest, Hon’ble Dr. S. Ayyappan, Secretary DARE and DG ICAR on 27th January 2016 at ICAR-National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources, New Delhi. In his opening remarks, he highlighted the role of Breeder Seed in sustaining the seed chain and stressed upon breeding institutes and scientists to take an important responsibility for bringing new crop varieties into seed chain. Dr. J.S. Chauhan, ADG (Seed), ICAR welcomed the dignitaries and the delegates. He informed the audience about the efforts and actions taken to augment the breeder seed production to vitalize the seed chain. He also suggested exploring the possibility of utilizing state department farms to meet the seed requirement and taking seed production in non-traditional areas during off-season especially of pearl millet and maize in Rajasthan. Dr. J.S. Sandhu, DDG (CS), ICAR chaired the inaugural session, in his opening remarks, he emphasized for revisiting Seed Multiplication Ratio of various crops  to address the concerns of decreasing indents especially wheat, maize, lentil, chickpea and groundnut and  suggested a comprehensive analysis pertaining to state wise adoption of new varieties, Seed and Variety  Replacement Rates. He called for review of seed rolling plans of various states for increasing indents for abating varietal mismatch in era of changing climate. He called upon National Seed Corporation and other public sector seed giants for promoting hybrids through Front Line Demonstrations for popularizing and inclusion of public sector bred hybrids in seed chain.

Sh. R.K. Singh, Joint Secretary (Seed), DoAC & FW, Co-Chairman of the meeting echoed issues with respect to Breeder Seed labelling, BSP centres failing to part package of practices to indenters, major shortfalls in breeder seed production particularly of oilseeds and pulses during 2014-15, Breeder Seed pricing and stressed upon possible replacement of GOT with DNA finger printing for quick and reliable method of genetic purity assessment. Dr. S. Rajendra Prasad, Project Director, ICAR-DSR, Mau presented Action Taken Reports on issues emerged in the  previous meeting held at ICAR-Regional centre for NEH, Umiam, Meghalaya during January 7-8, 2015 and also suggested about the setting up a national network of seed grid for Breeder Seed in select locations for soybean, chickpea, groundnut etc.  Dr. B.B. Singh, ADG (O&P), ICAR, New Delhi stressed upon issues related to seed production of protected varieties, wherein he requested all SAU’s / ICAR institutes to share Nucleus Seed of licensed variety for Breeder Seed production for the best interest of farming community. He also informed the participants about the Cabinet’s decision to assign the responsibility to ICAR and DAC & FW for establishing ‘Seed Hubs’ for production of seeds of pulses and advised them to submit suitable proposals for consideration. He was of the opinion that International Year of Pulses -2016 should duly be celebrated in a befitting manner and there should not be any short- fall of breeder seeds of pulses. 

Dr. K. C. Bansal, Director, NBPGR, New Delhi while welcoming the Chief Guest and other dignitaries spoke about wealth of germplasm at NBPGR, a treasure trove for present and future Crop Improvement to mitigate the challenges of climate change, and threats from  prevalent and new emerging disease and pests. He called the participating crop breeders to deposit with NBPGR samples of all the released varieties for conservation.

During the technical session, in-depth deliberations were undertaken for the various issues like non-lifting of breeder seeds and conversion of Breeder Seed into Foundation/Certified  Seed; complaints of stakeholders about quality of Breeder Seed produced at some centres; shortfall and varietal mismatch in seed production; revising calendar of operations and fixation of Breeder Seed price. Some of the stakeholders such as MSSC, RSSC, MPSSC and NSC expressed concerns regarding the quality pertaining to occurrence of off-types leading to rejection of subsequent generation of seed crop. Further, these public sector seed producing agencies requested the house to bring the Breeder Seed into the purview of seed certification. NSC requested DoAC & FW for funding all states to organize FLD’s for proper utilization of test stock seeds.  

Over 100 stake holders from SAUs, ICAR-Institutes, State Departments of Agriculture, DoAC & FW, State Seed Certification Agencies, National / State Seed Corporations participated in the meeting.

The following issues action plan emerged after in depth deliberations for further strengthening Breeder Seed production and its monitoring:

• DoAC should issue a directive to the indenting agencies for strictly adhering to the earlier decision of paying 25% advance of breeder seed production to ICAR-DSR, Mau, otherwise no breeder seed indent will be taken up for production [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• For compensatory seed production during off-season especially of soybean, groundnut and pulses, separate breeder seed price should be fixed to mitigate the increased cost of production [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• All the centers shall abide in ensuring the timely supply of breeder seed of allocated varieties to indenters well before the due as prescribed in the operation of calendar. In case of exigency, the BSP centres should advice the allottee for the suitable date not more than a week from the cut-off date. The centre should also communicate the lifting and non-lifting position by the allottees to ICAR-DSR Mau and DoAC & FW for timely action. [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]

• Sale rate of breeder seed of special quality traits such as QPM maize hybrid, sweet corn hybrid may be fixed separately other than the normal varieties of the same crop. [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• Dual pricing policy for breeder seed to the public and private indenters to be implemented from next year. [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• DoAC & FW should issue directives to the Department of Agriculture of Bihar, UP, MP and some other states to make pending payment towards the cost of breeder seed supplied to them earlier to avoid audit objections and funds for continuing the effective production of breeder seed. [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• Form of BSP-VI should invariably be furnished by concerned agency to know the conversion of Breeder Seed to foundation seed and certified seed. [Action: JS (Seed), DoAC & FW; ADG, (Seed), ICAR and PD, DSR, Mau]
• The Breeder Seed price of chickpea, field pea/garden pea, wheat soybean and groundnut was reduced by 10% and for rest of the crops, the price remains the same as fixed in the XVIII Annual Breeder Seed Review Meeting held during January 7-8, 2015, at Umiam, Meghalaya. It was also agreed that the price of breeder seed will be reviewed and revised during 2018 only. The revision of price of breeder seed should be based on cost of production. Accordingly, all the nodal officers should workout the cost of production of breeder seed as well as seed multiplication rate (SMR). [Action: BSP Centres and PD, DSR, Mau]
• The breeder seed production centres should continue to abide by the extant guidelines of Council concerning the licensing of varieties for commercialization. [Action: BSP Centres and PD, DSR, Mau]
• Jodhpur Agricultural University and MPUAT, Udaipur should organize off-season hybrid seed production of Pearl Millet and Maize respectively during the current Rabi/Summer season and also organize field days and awareness programmes for taking up hybrid seed production in large scale in new areas. [Action: BSP Centres and PD, DSR, Mau]

Breeder Seed selling price for the year 2016-17

Note: 10% reduction has been approved from existing price in crops viz., Chickpea, Field/garden pea, Wheat, Soybean and Groundnut.

Website: http://www.icar.org.in

Published: March 1, 2016