Plant breeding for organic and sustainable, low-input agriculture

Target oriented organic breeding of maize (Zea mays L.)
Géza Kovács
Agricultural Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Brunszvik, Hungary
Consumers expect organic food to have a higher nutritional value, to be healthier, or simply to be
safer or less risky. The effects of organic and ‘low input’ production methods on food quality
and safety and finally on livestock and human health are essential, and according to our recent
knowledge, the used crop varieties are playing a crucial role in the production of „functional
organic food”. For example, an extensive milk quality survey of different dairy production
systems demonstrated that milk from organic dairy systems has significantly higher levels of the
nutritionally desirable unsaturated fatty acids and fat soluble antioxidants compared to milk from
conventional production methods (Bauman et al. 2004). Unfortunately, under Hungarian
continental conditions the grazing-based period is quite limited and grain-feeding
supplementation is highly necessary for the animals, which results in a decreased quality of the
end product. To solve such problem nutritionally enhanced high oil maize varieties shall be bred
under certified organic conditions.
The development of nutritionally enhanced high oil inbred lines was initiated from an open
pollinated composite cross population (CCP) developed in our institute 12 years ago, and were
improved using xenia assisted reciproc recurrent selection under low input conditions. The
inbred line production was made under certified organic conditions, and the lines with excellent
combining ability were selected based on their high oil and protein content. Using the best
nutritionally enhanced (NE) inbreds several Sc and Tc hybrids were created and tested in large
scale experiments for 3 years on 4 organic farms at different locations in the country in
comparison of the conventional hybrids. At the same time new open pollinated varieties (OPV)
were produced and tested in the same places, to be able to evaluate the effectiveness of on farm
participatory breeding methods compared to the centralized hybrid breeding. The yielding
capacity and quality of the tested materials were analysed in all cases using standard chemical
and nutritional analytical methods.
According to the results obtained in the hybrid experiments the new NE Tc hybrids showed the
best adaptation under organic farming conditions, and their yield were highly competitive with
the conventional Tc maize hybrids in all locations, with a significantly better quality (8 % oil and
14 % protein). The data suggests, that, especially under low fertility conditions the Sc hybrids are
less adaptive in general, and they are highly sensitive to the farming technology (especially weed
management). The organically bred Sc hybrids showed significantly better results than the
conventional ones. The results of the VE OPVs are quite variable, as in some farms their yield
and quality were competitive with the VE Tc hybrids, and the farmers selection resulted in a
significant improvement of the population. On the contrary, under better conditions the same
OPVs had significantly lower yield and quality than the VE TC hybrids. According to the
feeding value tests the organically produced new VE hybrids and OPVs gave significantly better
results than the conventional hybrids.
Aknowledgements: The recent research was financed by the GVOP 3.1.1.-2004-05-0053/3.0
project.
59