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ADOPTION OF RICE VARIETIES – I. AGE OF VARIETIES AND PATTERNS OF VARIABILITY

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 September 2016

J. R. WITCOMBE ,
K. KHADKA ,
R. R. PURI ,
N. P. KHANAL ,
A. SAPKOTA  and
K. D. JOSHI
J. R. WITCOMBE*
Affiliation:
CAZS Natural Resources, Bangor University, Gwynedd LL57 2UW, UK
K. KHADKA
Affiliation:
Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development (LI-BIRD), Pokhara, Nepal
R. R. PURI
Affiliation:
Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development (LI-BIRD), Pokhara, Nepal
N. P. KHANAL
Affiliation:
Forum for Rural Welfare and Agricultural Reform for Development (FORWARD), Nepal
A. SAPKOTA
Affiliation:
Forum for Rural Welfare and Agricultural Reform for Development (FORWARD), Nepal
K. D. JOSHI
Affiliation:
CAZS Natural Resources, Bangor University c/o CIMMYT South Asia Regional Office, P. O. Box 5186, Kathmandu, Nepal
*
§§Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]
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Summary

Farmers who continue to grow old and obsolete varieties do not gain the benefits they could get from growing newer ones. Given the potential large scale of these foregone benefits, relatively few studies have examined the age of varieties that farmers grow. In three surveys, members of over 3300 households were interviewed to find the rice varieties they grew in 2008 and 2011 in 18 districts in the Terai, the low-altitude region of Nepal. This provided the first description of detailed geographical patterns of adoption of rice varieties and their ages that were repeated over time. There were large differences between district and individual varieties that showed specific geographical patterns of adoption. Such detailed knowledge on spatial diversity of varieties is invaluable for planning extension activities and developing breeding programmes, and cheaper ways than household surveys of collecting this information are discussed. Some of the factors considered important in determining this complex pattern of adoption were seed availability, growing environments that differed from east to west and the continued popularity of varieties once they had established markets. Rice diversity was low because a small number of rice varieties occupied large areas. In 2011, nine varieties covered at least 75% of the total rice area in western districts, just four in central districts and eight in eastern districts. Of these, most were released before 1995 resulting in a high average age of the predominant varieties – they always had an average age of over 20 years no matter which region or year was considered. Even though there were some large changes in varietal composition from 2008 to 2011, the average age of the predominant varieties remained almost the same. In a second paper in this series, we examine how these very low varietal replacement rates, that reduce yields and increase risk to farmers, can be accelerated using a participatory research for development approach called Informal Research and Development (IRD) (Joshi et al., 2012).

Type
Research Article
Information
Experimental Agriculture , Volume 53 , Issue 4 , October 2017 , pp. 512 - 527
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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Footnotes

1

Current address: School of Environment, Natural Resources and Geography (SENRGY), Bangor University, Gwynedd LL57 2UW, UK.

2

Current address: National Wheat Research Programme, Nepal Agricultural Research Council, Nepal.

3

Current address: CIMMYT South Asia Regional Office, P. O. Box 5186, Kathmandu, Nepal.

4

Current address: CIMMYT Pakistan, CSI Complex, NARC Park Road 44000, Islamabad, Pakistan.

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