REPORT - Search CIMMYT repository

TUNISIA
The Project for the Increase of Cereal
Production (ACCP) created by the government
of Tunisia with technical assistance from U.S.
AID, the Ford Foundation and CIMMYT is in
its third year of development. The formal research
program, however, was not begun until
the fall of 1968 when CIMMYT assigned four
scientists to the project. During the past two
years the Tunisian Project scientists in collaboration
with scientists from the aforementioned
organizations have been engaged in aggressive
"on farm research program" to develop
the technology which will make the so-called
"Mexican dwarf wheats" highly productive under
Tunisian conditions. Moreover, CIMMYT
scientists have been actively collaborating
with INRAT (Institut National de la Recherche
Agronomique Tunisian) in expanding the wheat
breeding program.
The outstanding results obtained with Mexican
wheats this year (1969-70) on farms where
the project recommendations of cultural practices
were followed gives great hope that the
Green Revolution, which prsviously has largely
been confined to irrigated lands, now will extend
across the rainfed areas of Tunisia, as
well as' much of the other wheat producing
preas of North Africa.
Tunisia cultivates approximately one million
hectares of wheat. Virtually all of it is dryland
winter rainfall production. Yields are very low.
The ten year average production is 550,000
metric tons compared to an annual consumption
of 800,000 metric tons. Two-thirds of the
production is durum wheat, the rest being soft
(bread) wheat. Currently the Project (ACCP)
is concentrating on the production of soft
wheats. However, the breeding aspects of the
program are also devoting much effort toward
developing new high yielding dwarf durum
varieties. Unless high yielding durum· varieties
are developed rapidly, the high yielding bread
(soft) wheats will drive durums out of production.
During the 1968-69 season, a year with
rainfall 20 to 60 percent below normal, dwarf
Mexican wheats were sown on 12,000 hectares.
It was clearly demonstrated that yields of 2,000
to 3,000 kilograms per hectare could be harvested
in the 250 to 300 mm rainfall belt when
good management practices were used. On
the basis of the highly favorable results last
year, plans were made to sow 150,000 hectares
during the 1969-70 crop season. Two factors
adversely intervened to make this target unrealistic.
Firstly, early torrential rains caused
extensive damage to the transportation infrastructure
and, moreover, flooded much of the
area programed for wheat. Consequently, fertilizer
and seed was not delivered on time and
seeding on schedule was impossible on many
inundated fields. Secondly, the re-distribution
of agricultural lands diverted much of the
needed attention away from seed and fertilizer
distribution. Despite these difficulties 53,000
hectares were sown to "Mexican dwarfs" during
the 1969-70 crop season.
The current harvests on all farms that followed
ACCP recommendations is excellent and
most gratifying. Grain yields of 2,500 to 4,000
kilograms per hectare were frequently harvested,
with an occasional field reaching 5,000
kilos on most areas. In the Governorat of
Beja, an overall commercial average yield of
2,300 kg/ha was reported in the south, and
3,400 kg/ha in the north.
The impact of the ACCP on soft (bread)
wheat production is already very great. Of the
1969-70 estimated soft wheat harvest, more
than half of the estimated crop of 180,000
tons is expected from the 53,000 hectares.
Expressed in another way, 19 percent of the
area sown to bread (soft) wheat under the
ACCP Program will produce more than half of
the crop. Moreover it is estimated that of the
53,000 hectares sown to dwarf Mexican wheats
during the past cycle, only about 20 percent
of the total area had the kind of management
technology that can produce high yields consistenly.
Therefore, the extension effort side of
the Project must now be strengthened and
made more dynamic and effective to correct
this defect.
The outstanding success of the ACCP during
the 1969-70 season now assures that the acreage
sown to Mexican dwarfs will increase
very rapidly. The main effort of the project
must now be to extend the use of the new
technology which makes these varieties highly
productive. Equally important will be the rapid
multiplication and release of newer high yielding
dwarf varieties with better disease resistance
94