[Dissertation] The Economics of Agricultural Research in British Punjab and Pakistani Punjab 1905-1975

Citation preview

THE ECONOMICS OF AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH IN BRITISH PUNJAB AND PAKISTANI PUNJAB 1905-1975

Carl E. Pray

A DISSERTATION

IN

ECONOMIC HISTORY

Presented to the Graduate Faculty of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

1978

iraduate Group Chairman

To My Mother and Mary

-iii-

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1

CHAPTER II

PRODUCTION STATISTICS AND THE GROWTH IN AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION

A.

British Punjab 1. 2. 3.

4. B.

Acreage of Crops Level of Yield Estimates Trend in Yield Estimates

Sources of Growth

3.

17 20 33

59

Introduction Reliability of the Official Statistics a. b.

13 14 17

50

Pakistani Punjab 1. 2.

C.

13

Introduction Official Data Gathering Procedure The Reliability a. b. c.

13

Acreage Statistics Yield Per Acre

Sources of Growth

59 60 60 61 90

Conclusions

100

CHAPTER III

THE DEVELOPMENT AND OUTPUT OF THE PUNJAB AGRICULTURE DEPART­ MENT -iv-

109

A. Introduction 1. 2. B.

109

PunjaJo History Budget Growth . ,

Ill 113

Education

116

C. Extension

126

1. 2. 3.

126 139 142

D.

British Punjab Partition One Unit and Present Day Extension

Research

152

1. Agricultural Chemistry and Engineering 2. Plant Breeding a. b.

Output Economic Model

153 158 159 165

i. Supply and Demand 166 ii. Motivation 169 iii. Technology of Plant Breeding . . . 176 c.

Explanation of Patterns of New Variety Development i. ii. iii.

d.

Cotton Wheat Other Crops

Conclusion

185 193 207 218 243

CHAPTER IV

COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS QF DAP RESEARCH

258

A.

Introduction

258

B.

British Punjab

258

C. Pakistani Punjab

288

-v-

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION • A. B.

340

The Productivity of Agricultural Research

340

The Influence of Supply and Demand Factors on the Output of Public Research Stations

357

C. Conclusions

363

INDEX

36G

BIBLIOGRAPHY

368

-vi-

LIST OF TABLES

CHAPTER II

Table 2-1

Number of Districts Covered by Crop-Cutting Experiments

18

Table 2-2

Consumption of Cotton 1930-37

23

Table 2-3

Cotton Yield Estimates From Various Sources (maunds/acre raw cotton)

25

Cultivator's Yields of Sugarcane (maunds of sugarcane)

26

Alternative Estimates of Sugarcane Yield (maunds/acre)

28

Table 2-6

Wheat Yield Estimates (maunds/acre)

30

Table 2-7

Official Yields of Various Crops in East Punjab

32

Table 2-8

Facts on Crop Yields Per Acre 1907-46

34

Table 2-9

Punjab Cotton Yields in the 1930s on Irrigated Land (maunds/acre raw cotton)

42

Irrigated and Unirrigated Sugarcane Yields 1938-46

47

Table 2-4

Table 2-5

Table 2-10

Table 2-11

Average Annual Yields of Sugarcane and Percent of Acreage Under Improved Sugarcane Varieties . . 49

Table 2-12

Disaggregation of Agricultural Growth 1907-46 . . 58

Table 2-13

Official and Random Sample Area Estimates (1000 acres)

62

Yield/Acre of Eight Major Crops 1942-1975 (annual average maunds/acre)

64

Official and Random Sample Estimates of Wheat Yields and Production 1944-76

67

Table 2-14

Table 2-15

Table 2-16

Official and R.S. Yield Estimates of Rice .... 70

-vii-

Table 2-17

Availability and Consumption of Foodgrains in West Pakistan 1959-64 (lbs./year) ..

72

Consumption vs. Availability of Selected Cereals, West Pakistan 1963-64 .

74

Availability vs. Consumption of Selected Cereals, 1968-69 - 1971-72

76

Saline and Waterlogged Land Under Cultivation in Eleven Punjab Districts

79

Average Annual Rainfall in Lahore and Rawalpindi

82

Comparison of Official and R.S. Production Estimates of Cotton

84

Per Capita Consumption and Availability of Sugar Products - 1968-69 - 1971-72 (annual average lbs. per capita)

87

Table 2-24

Yields of Co 312 at Risalawala

91

Table 2-25

Disaggregation of Agricultural Growth 1951-1975 .

94

Table 2-26

Regression Results Agricultural Output Produc­ tion Function

98

Table 2-18

Table 2-19

Table 2-20

Table 2-21

Table 2-22

Table 2-23

CHAPTER III

Table 3-1

Total DAP Expenditure (current prices)

114

Table 3-2

Expenditure of DAP on Research, Extension and Education

115

Faculty of the Agricultural College and University

119

Average Annual Expenditure of the Punjab Agri­ cultural College/University

120

Table 3-3

Table 3-4

Table 3-5

Qualifications of Lyallpur Faculty ....... 122

Table 3-6

Degrees Granted at Lyallpur (annual average)

Table 3-7

Occupations of Agriculture Graduate in 1926 . . . 127 -viii-

. .

125

Table 3-8

Number of Extension Personnel and Area Covered

132

Seed Distribution by DAP Annual Average (1000 maunds)

137

Extension Personnel After 1947 in the Districts of Present Day Punjab

143

Table 3-11

DAP Research Staff by Discipline . . -

154

Table 3-12

Successful New Varieities - All Crops

160

Table 3-13

Average Annual Number of New Crosses of Wheat

213

Table 3-14

First Use of Breeding Techniques

220

Table 3-15

DAP Botanists and Horticulturalists by Crop Speciality

225

Value of Crops and Ratio of Value to Number of Scientists (crores of current Rs.)

229

Table 3-9

Table 3-10

Table 3-16

CHAPTER IV

Table 4-1

Staple Lengths of Punjabi Cottons

260

Table 4-2

Average Cotton Prices in Khanewal Market 1930-31 - 1940-41

261

Wheat Yields - Experimental Farms (maunds/ acre)

262

Wheat Yields by Variety as Estimated by Sukhatme

265

Table 4-5

Sugarcane Yields - Lyallpur (in terms of gur) .

268

Table 4-6

Sugarcane Yields - Other Experimental Farms (maunds of gur)

269

Table 4-7

Area Under Improved Varieties

271

Table 4-8

Calculations of k

275

Table 4-3

Table 4-4

-ix-

Table 4-9

The Lower Bound Estimates of Producers Surplus (annual averages)

281

Rates of Return to Pre-1947 Research Under Various Assumptions

289

Changes in Yield/Acre and Inputs of Four Crops

291

Official Estimates of Wheat Yield/Acre by Variety (mds./acre)

294

Unofficial Estimates of Wheat Yield/Acre by Variety

295

Table 4-14

Cotton Varieties Released After 1947

297

Table 4-15

Yield/Acre Old American and New American Cotton (maunds/acre raw cotton)

304

Table 4-16

Yield Per Acre of Rice Varieties Punjab

305

Table 4-17

Average Yield Per Acre for Different Cane Varieties 1968-1969 (maunds/acre)

307

Table 4-18

Productivity Change

308

Table 4-19

Percentage of Acreage Under New Varieties After 1947

310

Producer's Surplus by Crop 1956-75 (1000*s of 1960 Rs.)

319

Table 4-10

Table 4-11

Table 4-12

Table 4-13

Table 4-20

Table 4-21

Yield Per Acre Regression Estimates and Growth Rates of Variables (t statistic in parentheses) . 322

Table 4-22

Internal Rates of Return to Research and Exten­ sion After 1947

333

CHAPTER V

Table 5-1

Rates of Return on Various Projects

347

Table 5-2

Consumption of Punjab Cotton Crop 1937-38 (1000 bales)

361

-x-

LIST OP FIGURES

CHAPTER II

Figure 2-1

Greater Punjab Yield Per Acre of All-Crops, Foodgrains and Non-Foodgrains, Five Year Moving Averages, Semilogarithmic Scale

40

CHAPTER III

Figure 3-1

Evenson-Kislev Model of Technological Research

Figure 3-2a

Lag Between First Use of Selection Technique and Release of An Improved Crop Variety

222

Lag Between First Use of Hybridization and the Release of An Improved Crop Variety

223

Figure 3-2b

. 188

CHAPTER IV

Figure 4-1

Shift in Supply Due to an Increase in Yield Per Acre

273

Shifts in the Supply and Demand Curves of Wheat

277

Figure 4-3

Producers Surplus in American Cotton

279

Figure 4-4

Wheat Supply and Demand Conditions After 1947 . . 314

Figure 4-5

Rice Supply and Demand Conditions After 1947 . . 316

Figure 4-6

Sugarcane Supply and Demand Conditions After 1947

Figure 4-2

Figure 4-7

318

Streams of Economic Benefits From New Crop Varieties With and Without Local Research .... 327

-xi-

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

In recent years there has been a substantial increase in research on the subject of the economics of agricultural research.

The first

studies in this area were undertaken by Griliches in the late 1950s. Then there was little activity until the late 1960s when a number of studies were published concerning the economics of agricultural re­ search in the U.S. and in LDCs.

This interest led to the first confer­

ence on the subject in 1969 in Minnesota.

The papers from the confer­

ence, which concentrated mainly on agricultural research in the U.S., were published in the volume Resource Allocation in Agricultural Research.

A second conference on the economics of agricultural re­

search held in 1975 concentrated on research outside the United States.

By that time there had been several important theoretical

advances.

The first of these was the attempt by Hayami and Ruttan to

make agricultural research an endogenous part of the theory of economic growth with the induced innovation theory.

2

Another important theoreti-

cal and empirical advance was the work of Evenson and Kislev.

3

On the

basis of a very large amount of international data on agricultural research and agricultural production they were able to tackle a number of important questions about the spread of technology, the productivity of research and the value of different types of research. Thus, the 1975 conference had a wide range of theoretical issues and empirical work to discuss.

Arndt and Ruttan in their introduction to the book of -1-

—2

-188-

-189appear. Before examining specific crops it is clear that several parts of this model have to be changed to fit the Punjab.

The first set of prob­

lems in this model is due to the fact that it is based on sugarcane, which rarely reproduces sexually.

All of the other main crops of the

Punjab do reproduce sexually, and so the distribution of varieties which the farmer or breeder searches in the initial stages has a much wider variance than sugarcane does.

The distribution of varieties of other

crops probably looked more like the curve labeled farmers in 3.1a.

Also,

the concentration on sugarcane has meant that Evenson and Kislev missed the importance of pure-line or single-plant selection in self-pollinated crops.

For wheat and cotton this was a very important stage in the

developrr.&nt of new varieties.

Table 3-12 shows that all of the important

varieties of cotton produced before Independence and two of the most important wheat varieties were produced using this method.

The quotation

on page 179 shows that it was an important step forward from the mass selection technique that had been used. to be modified in two ways.

Therefore the Evenson model needs

In the first stage the distribution of

varieties should be changed from "sugarcane" in 3.1a to "farmers".

The

second stage,which in Evenson's model was a stage of random crossing, is the selection stage in the modified model.

In its pure-line

selection is used to develop new varieties of self-pollinated crops and mass-selection is carried out by the DAP on cross-pollinated crops.

I

have drawn this stage (the curve labeled in DAP in Figure 3.1a) as having a greater variance than stage one because the DAP breeders had access to more varieties than any farmer did.

The systematic crop surveys de­

-190scribed below made it possible for the breeders to work with a large number of local varieties, and they had access to the collections of other provinces through the work of Sir Albert Howard at Pusa.

How­

ever, the main advance was in self-pollinated crops where breeders could now pick out varieties that were genetically superior and hence would retain their superiority as long as they were not mixed with other genetic material. The other part of this model that needed to be modified is the mechanism by which one moves from one stage to the next.

In the Evenson-

Kislev model, the discovery of a new breeding technology shifts researchers from one stage to the next.

In the Punjab by 1907 when Milne was appoint­

ed economic botanist in the Plnjab the main techniques for breeding selfpollinating crops were already known.

Both selection and hybridization

were being used in India in these crops.

It is only in the cross-polli­

nated crcps that the discovery of new breeding technology may have been necessary for the development of new varieties. Selection, introduction, and hybridization were known as ways of improving crops in India before the rediscovery of Mendal's laws of heredity.

Various methods of selection — mass, single-ear, and single-

plant — had been used by farmers from time immemorial and by government officials of British India, when they had the opportunity.

As mentioned

above numerous varieties of wheat and cotton had been introduced before the organization of the DAP,

The technique of cross-breeding or hybridi­

zing crops was known at least by 1901 when Indian officials returned from U.S. and Australia after learing this technique.

107

-191Soon after the rediscovery of Mendal's law in Europe, scientists in India were aware of its importance to plant-breeding.

Albert Howard, the

first Imperial Economic Botanist, in his book on Indian wheat published in 1909 discussed the current research that was being done on genetics

and its applicability to India work.

108

His interpretation of these laws

is quoted below because of its impact on Indian and Punjabi breeding: The most modern investigations on heredity indicate that hybridization can only sagely follow the isolation and testing of pure lines produced from a once-for-all selection of a single plant. Hence in India where the wheat fields of the country are mixed to an extent unknown in Europe, selection must precede hybridization and indeed must come be­ fore any other form of experiment with this crop.1^9 This emphasis on pure-line breeding remained the main principle of all Indian plant breeding at least until the 1930s. The technique for using hybrid-vigor

to

produce high-yielding,

cross-pollinated crops like maize and sorghum was not developed in the United States until 1918 and no commercial varieties were produced there until the late 1930s.

There is no evidence that this technique

was used in the Punjab before the 1940s.

The technique of producing

synthetic varieties of maize was not used until the late 1960s.

An­

other technique that was introduced after the Department was created was the back-cross in self-pollinated crops.

This technique was

first developed in the U.S. in the 1920s and produced a commerical variety of wheat for the first time in 1 9 3 5 . I t was being used in the Punjab in the late 1930s.

-192The need for local research stations in the various agro-climatic regions of the Punjab was recognized very soon by the DAP.

While all of

the breeding took place at Lyallpur in the early days, varieties were sent out to the Gurdaspur and Hansi farms for testing.

This need must have

been evident from the beginning due to the striking contrast in the Punjab between the canal-irrigated cropping patterns of the canal colonies and the famine-prone, rainfed agriculture of the southeastern part of the Province.

The question remains as to when they recognized the advantages of

actually doing some of the breeding outside of Lyallpur.

It certainly

was recognized by the'early 1930s, but I cannot date it any better than that. Since the three main techniques for breeding self-pollinated crops — selection, hybridization, and location-specific breeding — were known since the early days of the DAP, as were mass-selection and loca­ tion-specific breeding for cross-pollinated crops, cost considerations and diminishing returns were probably the main factors which determined when breeders moved from one technique to another.

They chose the cheapest

technique and used it until diminishing returns raised the cost of pro­ ducing another new variety equal to the cost of producing a variety with the next most expensive techniques. It is only in the cross-pollinated crops like maize and bajra that the development of new varieties may have been held back by the lack of breeding techniques. In addition to the supply model discussed above, other supply and demand factors may have affected the pattern of variety development. demand side determines the goals of a particular breeding program.

The In

-193wheat, for example, high yield and adequate quality haye been the goals which reflected the desires of the farmers.

In gram, disease

problems plagued the farmers, and so most breeding work was aimed at providing disease resistance while maintaining an adequate level of yields and quality.

If there was a sudden increase or change in

demand with supply factors held constant, the varieties released would also be increased,

A sudden increase in disease problems

eventually led to the release of disease-resistant varieties of gram. The decreased demand for desi cotton in World War II relative to Ameri­ can cotton led to the development of an American variety 216F for the Southeastern cotton tract where desi had been the only corp grown. On the supply side we are concerned with the budget constraint and cost and. availability of inputs in addition to the model of breed­ ing technology presented above.

Some of the changes in these factors

that affect the pattern of variety development are:

bigger budgets

have enabled breeders to develop improved varieties of previously un­ improved crops or do more intensive work on already improved crops; and changes in the supply of skilled labor such as the exodus of Hindu and Sikh scientists from West Punjab at Partition can obviously slow the pro­ duction of new varieties.

i.

Cotton

When Milne started work on cotton one group of consumers of the farmers' output had already expressed their demands.

British cotton

interests wanted longer staple cotton than the Punjab was currently pro­ ducing.

Milne is quoted above (p. 166) saying that the farmers would

-194start growing longer stapled varieties only if they would give higher profits than the old varieties.

Thus, the goals of his breeding program

had to include not only longer lint but also the high yield, and high ginning outturn which were demanded by the farmers. In both wheat and cotton some hybridization was done in the first few years after the DAP was established.

However, it was soon

discontinued, and all the economic botanist ! s efforts were concentrated on selection.

There are two reasons suggested in the literature.

first may have been Howard's interpretation of Mendal,

The

The second

reason is indicated in the final report of the RCA. Hybridization is a much slower process than selection and requires greater scientific experience and a higher level of scientific aptitude. Sooner or later, of course, there comes a point when the plant breeder may be forced to resort to hybridization if any pro­ gress is to be secured.

In other words it cost more to produce a variety through hybridization. It was slower.

It used up more land and unskilled labor and also required

more of that very scarce resource in early Twentieth Century Punjab — expert and experienced manpower. Selection of cotton varieties in Punjab was a two step process. First there was the preliminary collection of as many local types from all over the Province as was possible in several seasons.

Second, the

economic botanist ran a much more extensive survey of the crop in each district in which it was important,

These surveys took over ten years

to complete, and they actually examined between 10 and 15 percent of the cotton fields.

Milne, the economic botanist stated the following objec­

tives of these surveys;

-19'5-

start growing longer stapled varieties only if they would give higher profits than the old varieties.

Thus, the goals of his breeding program

had to include not only longer lint but also high yield, and high ginning outturn which were the demands of the farmers. In both wheat and cotton some hybridization was done in the first few years after the DAP was established.

However, it was soon discon­

tinued, and all the Economic Botanist's efforts were concentrated on selection.

There are two reasons suggested in the literature.

may have been Howard's interpretation of Mendal.

The first

The second reason is

indicated in the final report of the RCA. Hybridization is a much slower process than selection and requires greater scientific experience and a higher level of scientific aptitude. Sooner or later, of course, there comes a point when the plant breeder may be forced to resort to hybridization if any progress is to be secured.m In other words it costs more to produce a variety through hybridization. It is slower. So it uses up more land and unskilled labor and also requires more of that very scarce resource in early Twentieth Century Punjab — expert and experienced manpower. Selection of cotton varieties in Punjab was a two step process. First there was the preliminary collection of as many local types from all over the Province as was possible in several seasons.

Second, the

Economic Botanist ran a much more extensive survey of the crop in each district in which it was important.

These surveys took over ten years

to complete, and they actually examined between 10 and 15 percent of the cotton fields.

Milne, the Economic Botanist stated the following objec­

tives of these surveys:

-196-

1.

To show whether I have all the Punjab types in my collection,

2.

To show whether these types vary in character in different localities and if so, to what extent,

3.

To discover in what localities certain types predominate and how they succeed there from the farmers' point of view so as to give us some indication of where our pure types, when ready to be send out, may be expected to do well,

4.

To collect information on the natural and agricultural conditions in which these cottons are grown and any other information which will help us to decide how far or in what way we may expect to improve cotton farming. 1 -'- 2

He also remarks on the value of these surveys beyond simply collecting varieties: By bringing myself and staff in closer contact with the zamindars these surveys also give us a more intimate knowledge than we would otherwise get of the particular difficulties of farmers in the differ­ ent localities and conditions and of the points of view of these men. We have in this way already collected a good deal of information of much use in guiding me in my work of producing a cotton which will leave to zamindars a larger profit per acre than those already grown.113

As these types of cotton were collected Milne and his assistants in Lyallpur started isolating the pure lines by single plant selection. Table 3-12 shows that in cotton the DAP met with rapid success. About five years after the preliminary collection of varieties had taken place an improved American cotton variety named 4-F was released and was used extensively by farmers.

4-F was selected from the patches of

-197of cotton locally called "narma" which were found growing in Shahpur,

Jullundur and Lahore districts.

It was probably a descendent of the

American cotton varieties which had been brought from Dharwar in Central India in 1876 and 1877.

114

Narma had never been commercially important

because it was grown in scattered plots, mixed with local varieties. Therefore its superior quality was not recognized by the trade. advantage of 4-F over narma was its uniform quality.

The main

Due to the marketing

role that the DAP played in the early years of its use, traders were aware of its improved qaulity, and they were willing to pay a price premium over both the local varieties and the mixed Americans.

Also, 4-F probably

yielded more than the local narma. A second variety produced by Mr. Milne was 289F.

According to

Afzal, who became the cotton botanist in 1931, Milne did not appreciate the

need to breed varieties for the various regions of Punjab and so this variety

maintained a precarious existence in the Botanical Section at

Lyallpur for some years until it was resurrected by Mr. William of the B.C.G.A.

Roberts

He tried this variety extensively in Khanewal and found

that it did quite well there in 1921.

It spread from there and became

popular in the Southwestern regions of the province.

3.15

Its lint was

longer than 4-F and so the lint received a price premium over 4-F.

The

main problem with 289F was the low ginning outturn (percentage of the weight of the raw cotton that is lint) which limited its acceptance in other parts of the Province. Selection work on desi cotton was also done.

Several improved

varieties Z. Mollisoni and 278 Mollisoni (which I have lumped together as Mollisoni in Table 3-12) were developed and released in 1921.

These

-198-

varieties were superior to the local mixtures in yield and ginning out­ turn. The breeding program was slowed up in 1922 when Mr. Milne was appointed Director of Agriculture, Punjab.

"His varieties were soon

rendered impure and it was realized that the importance of the cotton 114 crop in the Province demanded a full time properly trained staff." The Indian Central Cotton Committee, which had just been founded in 1923, substantially reduced the budget constraint on the cotton section by pro­ viding money to the DAP for the Punjab Botanical Research Scheme in 1925. With this money and some from the DAP budget a 200 acre farm in Lyallpur District was purchased and equipped, and a cotton botanist was hired. The work of the new cotton botanist began with an examination of the Desi and American cotton plants which were on hand in the cotton section. field.

117

In 1926 thousands of plants were gathered from cultivators' From the desi varieties,15-Mollisoni was first selected be­

cause of its high ginning outturn and yield per acre.

It was realized

that there could still be some improvement through selection of Desi, and so development work continued. The result was 39-Mollisoni which yielded more more than 15 Mollisoni and had a higher ginning outturn (37% for M-39, 35% for M-15).

It was decided in the late 1920s that

a longer stapled desi cotton could also be profitable for farmers. as Afzal observed: It must, however, be admitted that there is hardly any variability in the staple length in the local Punjab desi cottons, and therefore, the chances of improvement in this character by selection are non­ existent. It was, therefore, imperative that any improvement sought in this direction must be based

But

-199-

on hybridization.

118

So, in 1930 the first hybridization program of cotton was started and 39Mollisoni was crossed with Chinese Million Dollar. This program ended in the early 1940s with the Jubilee variety, and Afzal, who may have been a somewhat biased source, reports in 1947: All the expert opinions and tests, therefore, leave little doubt regarding the superiority of Jubilee over ordinary Mollisoni. This cotton would have been released...but for the policy of the Indian Central Cotton Committee not to encourage cultivation of any type of desi cotton during the recent war.-'The one reason for doubting Afzal's opinion of this is that after the war this variety was not released either in India or Pakistan while several of the other desi varieties developed during the war were eventually re­ leased. The one American variety that was developed during the 1920s and then was released in 1933 was 289F/43.

This variety was discovered in

1925 in the Botanical section of the Lyallpur farm by the cotton botanist. It turned out to be a natural hybrid which yielded better than 4-F, had lint of very high quality, and was quite tolerant of water shortage.

How­

ever, the ginning outturn was very low about (30 percent) and so it never gained wide popularity. The other two American varieties that were released in the early 1930s, L.S.S. and 289F/K25, do not fit neatly into the supply and demand framework.

They were developed in response to the same demand for cottons

of long lint and high yield which led the DAP to develop 289F/43, but they were not developed through systematic research on the part of the

-200-

DAP.

289F/IC25 was developed by the staff of Mr. Robert's private B.C.G.A.

farm in Khanewal.

Under his direction they were trying for a variety with

the same lint quality as 289F but a higher ginning outturn. ted 289F/K25 which had all the desired characteristics.

They selec­

It wan particular­

ly well suited to the Southwestern cotton tract and at its peak covered 12 0

over 550,000 acres.

Equally important for the central canal colonies was the discovery of LSS.

It was found by the Deputy Director of Agriculture at Lyallpur

on the college farm.

He described its development in the DDA,Lyallpur,

Report 1930: The year 1926 was a bad one for American cotton. The writer made extensive observations of cotton fields in that year in the month of November. During the course of making these observations he came across a plant in a 4-F cotton field in square 16 which had all its bolls open well. Seed was also well developed. There were also some green leaves on the plant. The leaves of all surrounding plants had turned red and bolls had opened imperfectly having underdeveloped seed. The seed of this plant multiplied and tried against ordinary 4-F in 1928 at the students farm. The results being very encouraging it was tested against 4-F in the tenants area during the year under report in long narrow strips. These tests also proved successful• In 1933 it was released to cultivators

122

and by 1943 covered over 400,000 acres.

In the mid-1930s the budget constraints were again eased.

The ICCC

increased its contribution beginning in 1934, and in the next few years the DAP budget as a whole increased substantially.

This money was used

to set up sub-stations in the main cotton-growing regions of the pro­ vince.

Afzal and the others involved in cotton had apparently decided

that it was a "local" crop and as such had to be attacked in this manner. There also was probably some demand pressure to spread the benefits of the DAP beyond the canal colonies as was expressed before the Royal Commission.

It is possible that having run into diminishing returns in

selection at Lyallpur, they had to turn either to selection at sub­ stations or to alarge hybridization program and that they decided that the former program offered the higher probability of success at a lower cost. Certainly at this time selection was a proven technique while hybridiza­ tion had produced only one success in the Punjab, C-591, and that was only at its early stages. A series of sub-stations were opened beginning with the Multan station in 1935.

This was followed by the IChanewal sub-station in 1938

and one each in Hansi and Jhang in 1941.

The pattern of action after

opening a sub-station was to plant promising material from the previously existing stations and at the same time make selections from the fields of cultivators in that tract.

If sufficient variation of the desired traits

was found selection was the technique chosen.

In the cases where there

123 was not sufficient variation they would report to hybridization. The Multan sub-station was the most successful as Table 3-12 shows. It produced one improved desi, 119-Sanguineum, and two Americans, 124F and 199F.

Little had been done with the desi in this area.

So, 119-S

was quickly developed from a selection found in a cultivator's field and released in 1941.

It was a heavy yielder and had a higher ginning out­

turn than the local mixtures. was being grown in Multan.

124F was a selection from the 239F which

It was not released until about ten years

after work was started at the Multan station.

According to the cotton

-202-

botanist it was ready for release in 1941, but the head of the DAP was 124 not convinced of its value and refused to release it. It was already being used on 170,000 acres when it was approved.

It had some advantage

in yield over 239F and 289F/K25, but its main advantage over K25 was that it was resistant to jassids. which

had

199F was produced from a natural cross,

125 occurred in a group a 4-F plants from the Sind.

It

gave a very good yield, had a high ginning outturn and had the finest lint of any Punjabi variety at that time.

These two varieties completely

replaced 289F and 289F/K25 soon after Independence. The work at Hansi in the 1940s and the large hybridization scheme of the 1940s provide good examples of the way changes in demand can lead to the development of new varieties. The Hansi program was set up to improve the desi cotton in the Southeastern part of the Punjab.

However,

the beginning of the war cut off the main customers for desi cotton exports

sending prices downward.

The cotton botanist responded to this

by trying to develop American varieties for the Southeast where they had never been successfully grown in the past.

He began breeding for earli-

ness so that it would be able to withstand the droughty conditions there. 216F had been isolated at Lyallpur, but had failed there because it matured so quickly.

It was transferred to Hansi in 1942 and tested

against the local desis.

It out-yielded the best desi varieties and be­

cause of the very high price premium it received over desi became very 125 popular in the southeast. During the 193 0s in India there was a rapidly increasing demand for higher quality cotton fabrics which would only be made from cotton with

lint that was an inch or longer. .Almost none of the Indian varieties were that long and so the Bombay mills had to import increasing amounts of this type of cotton.

Perhaps in response to this the Punjabi breeders

had started some hybridization.

However, after the beginning of the

Second World War, which cut of the supply of the long stapled cotton and the demand for short stapled cotton, they came under pressure from the 127 ICCC to produce a long-lint variety.

Breeders used a three pronged

attack, first, selection from American varieties which showed sufficient variation; second, hybridization of local American- varieties; third, the hybridization of local ^nerican varieties with promising foreign longlinted varieties. It was this program — particularly the last two parts of it which were started in 1943 and 1944 -- that led to the long-linted varieties of the 1950s and 60s in Pakistani Punjab such as AC134, AC307 and Lasani-11. At Independence the cotton section was far less disrupted than any of the other research sections.

Aside from the assistant cotton botanist

most of the personnel of this section including the cotton botanist were Muslims and decided to stay in Pakistan.

As mentioned above a Pakistan

Central Cotton Committee (P.C.C.C.) was immediately set-up and began to fund research in the Punjab.

In the Pakistani Punjab two important varie­

ties which were the result of hybridization.were released — AC134 which is today the most widely used cotton variety in the Punjab and Lasani-11 which had longer lint than any of the varieties.

Another vari^tv ^C307

also was widely used but it was never officially approved possibly due to political or personal rather than agricultural reasons.

The P.C.C.C.

-204-

supported the spread of cotton breeding sub-stations to new areas of the Province -- Montgomery (now called Sahiwal), the Thai irrigation project, and Bahawalpur.

These sub-stations rather quickly proved their worth

with Montgomery producing AC134 and Bahawalpur developing BS-1. In BS-1 there is the first evidence of the effects of the use of recently imported American cotton varieties.

According to Ansar

BS-1 is the natural cross of two varieties from the Sind M-100 and M-4 and M-100 is the result of the crossing of M-4 with the American variety 128

Wilds.

The second important impact of new Americans was in the develop­

ment of 149F which is the result of a cross between 124F and the imported American variety Badel made in 1960-61. release in 1971.

129

This variety was approved for

One American variety, Delta Pine, was tested and was

grown on over 40,000 acres in 1972-73. ' However, it was never officially released by the government, and farmers soon lost their enthusiasm for the same reason the officials had been reluctant to release it — Delta Pine is very susceptible to insect attack.

130 16,300 acres.

Another

variety

So by 1974-75 it was grown on only

B-557 developed by hybridization was

released by the Department in 1975 but it is too early to tell how important it will be. In general the period after 1963 has been a disappointing one.

Of

the three varieties released only 149F has become commercially important. Since it takes ten years to develop a hybrid, the problems must have be­ gun in the mid to late 1950s. been lacking in resources.

The cotton section does not seern to have

Table 3-15 indicates that in 1960 they had

more botanists than any other crop, and they also had more sub-stations than the others.

There was also the introduction of new genetic material

-205

from outside Pakistan although it was not of the same quantity nor was it done with the same amount of support as the wheat, maize, and rice programs.,

Also there were no high-yielding cotton varieties which

were specially developed for the tropics like there were in the cases of wheat and rice.

Still one would expect more new varieties.

It seems

that political squabbles must bear some of the blame for the apparent drop in productivity.

Politics has probably directly decreased the

number of varieties in Table 3-12 by making it a crime to grow certain varieties produced by the DAP.

The example of AC307 was mentioned above.

Despite the fact that it was never released and as such was illegal to 131 grow, it was being grown on 89,000 acres in 1974-75.

This indicates

that its suppression was for something other than economic or agri­ cultural reasons.

Other varieties bred by the "wrong" people may also

have been suppressed.

Indirectly politicians probably held down the

number of varieties produced by removing people who they felt were politically or personally opposed to them.

In addition to having some

of his varieties rejected the cotton botanist of the 1950s was eventual­ ly transferred to a desk job where he had essentially nothing tc do. Thus, the botanist who developed AC134, Lasani-11, and AC307 and in the process contributed more to the well-being of the Punjabi than any single scientist in the 1950s was not allowed to do any cotton breeding. Whether the struggle that led to his dismissal is over or not is un­ clear.

Not until the early 1980s will we be able to tell if the large

increases in funds to cotton research of the early 1970s will pay off.

-206-

In summary there are several groups of varieties and one non-group to be explained in cotton.

The first varieties produced by the DAP were

the result of the early selection work of Milne, in other words the intro­ duction of single-plant selection which is the second stage in our model. The nest group of Americans and desis, which was released in the early thirties, was simply the result of an increased supply of in­ puts due to the funds from the Indian Central Cotton Committee.

There

was also the lucky find of L.S.S. and the development of 289F/K25 outside the DAP.

The 1945 group of cotton varieties was the result of a shift

to a new breeding strategy — the attempt to develop varieties for specif­ ic locations.

The group in the late 1950s was also due to the movement to

a new stage in the breeding process -- these varieties all developed out of the hybridization program started in the 1940s before Independence. The one non-group came

in the 1960s and 1970s,

when despite a substantial

increase in budget and trained personnel very little has been produced. This can be interpreted as supporting the diminishing return argument that in the absence of a breakthrough in breeding technology or the introduction of productive, new genetic material,one should not expect to get many more new varieties.

The counter-argument is that political

interference has decreased the number of varieties released and decreased the motivation of workers to produce new varieties. The role of changes in demand is very clear in the case of cotton — after 1941 no desi cotton varieties were released, due to the fact that there was no demand for desi cotton during or after World War II.

This

shift in demand also led to the development of variety 216F for the

-207-

southeastern part of the Punjab. Thus, the basic pattern caused by the shifts from one stage to the next in our supply side model shows through,,although it is obscured some­ what by changes in other supply and demand factors.

The importance of-

diminishing returns in moving breeders from one stage to the next is clear, as is their awareness of the cost differentials between the various stages of breeding.

However, another modification in the original model is shown

to be necessary -- location-specific breeding does not have to come after hybridization.

In cotton the selection technique used at widely dispersed

locations proved to be an effective strategy for developing new varieties.

ii.

Wheat

The strategy for improving wheat was the same as it was for cotton during the first twenty years of the DAP. This is not too surprising since they were under the same man for most of that period.

The first wheats collected

were separated into 25 agricultural types in 1908 and then tested for economic characteristics(mainly yield and grain quality),. Punjab Type 11, which was found in

many

fields in the canal colonies, gave the high­

est yields and was high in quality with a white grain.

The pure variety

released by DAP was an improvement over the mixed white-grained wheats from which it had been selected.

Sir William Roberts observed:

....except in the case of crops grown from seed supplied by the Department it is never pure, and there are many fields in which other varieties predominate. The pure variety naturally gives a higher yield than these mixtures, especially as as selected seed is distributed. And owing to its freedom from barley and red wheat, the pure

-208-

grain fetches a premium of annas 2 or so in the market on the ordinary mixed wheat.

From district surveys after 1908 Milne and his staff were able to isolate a large number of new unit types beyond the 25 identified earlier. One of these, 8-A, yielded more than ?-ll and had a higher quality grain.

In 1919 this wheat was approved for cultivation by the

133 Department. In the Resume of Fifty Years Research Work at Lyallpur the earliest hybridization work was described as follows: The greatest step towards the improvement of Punjab wheats was taken in 1926 when it was realized that no further progress was possible through pure line selection and hybridization was resorted to.... The first series of crosses made were between Punjab type 9, 8A, and 8B. These types of possessed certain desirable characters like "high-yielding capacity" and "wide range of adaptability" (8A) good quality (8B) and and stiff stem (9), but suffered from certain drawbacks like susceptibility to lodging on rich soils (8A) low-yielding capacity and liability to shatter grain (8B) lateness and red color of grains (9). In order, therefore, to combine the desirable characters in a single variety, a number of crosses between these varieties were made, as result of which a large number of promising derivatives be­ came available.1^4

From these crosses two varieties were developed and handed over to the farmers.

The first, C518, was released to farmers in 1933.

It has

very high quality, amber grain and gave higher yields than 8A on rich, irrigated land.

The second variety, C591 distributed to farmers for

the first time in 1934 was to become the premier wheat of northern Indian and Pakistan by 1947.

It had high quality amber grain and is

-209-

still the standard against which all other wheats are judged when it comes to making chapatis.

In addition it out-yielded other varieties

on both rich and poor soil and under all water supply conditions except extreme water shortage. In 1926 a cerealist. was appointed and for the first time the botanist who was working on cereals did not have to spend half of his time on cottons.

The appointment of other botanists to work on crops like gram,

millets and oilseeds and an assistant botanist for rice allowed him more time to concentrate on wheat.

It seems probable that this greater supply

of skilled labor in conjunction with the diminishing returns to selection caused the initiation of the hybridization program in 1926. A second series of crosses was made at Lyallpur in the early 1930s. These crosses were between Punjab varieties and a number of exotic varie­ ties which had come from the U.S.A., Russia, Canada and Australia.

At

about the same time the first cereal breeding sub-stations were set up in Lahaul (1933), Rawalpindi (1936), Gurgaon (1937), and Gurdaspur (1940). The Lahaul station was in the mountains and was used to grow a summer crop, which cut breeding time in half.

Although no actual hybridization

was done at sub-stations in contrast to the cotton sub-stations, they definitely used to test the new crosses produced by hybridization.

One

of the crosses from the second series C228 (Hard Federation x Punjab 9D) was released in 1941 for late sowing under irrigated conditions.

The

next two varieties released, C217 and C250, seem to have been the re­ sult of the combination of the hybridization programs and the new sub­ stations.

C217 was one of the crosses from the second series, and after

extensive testing under barani (rainfed) conditions in Rawalpindi it was released in 1944.

It was to be used under barani conditions in the

northern part of the Punjab.

C250 from the same series of crosses was

released for use in the humid areas of Sialkot, Gurdaspur, and Gujranwala Districts where yellow rust prevails.

Apparently testing at the Gurdaspur

sub-station had revealed its ability to resist this type of rust. The turmoil of Partition in 1947 completely disrupted the work of the cerealists.

The cereal botanist and almost all of his assistant were

non-Muslims and chose to go to India.

The seeds and records which they

could not take with them they mixed up or destroyed.

The remaining

assistant botanist, who had been the head of the rice breeding scheme, took over as cerealist.

A good deal of time was spend sorting out the

remaining seeds by growing and selecting them again.

Also considerable

effort was expended building up the personnel of the section in the face of a serious dearth of skilled manpower throughout Pakistan.

It is

perhaps for this reason that there were no new varieties until 1957 when C-271 and C-273 were released to farmers.

These varieties resulted from

crosses made between a local and an exotic variety in the case of C-271 and two local varieties in the case of 0273. They had very high quality grain, virtually identical to C-591; were slightly higher yielding than C-591; and their main advantage was that they were more rust resistant than the older varieties."^6

In 1953

FAQ

gave Pakistan some 250

varieties to test for disease resistance and along with the USDA has continued to build up this genetic collection.

However, the results of

these introductions do not show up until after 1960.

Then in the early

-211-

1960s the Australian variety Dirk was successfully introduced. The last period of wheat breeding -- the Green Revolution and be­ yond — is marked by four characteristics; first, there was a shift in the aims of the breeding program to the aim of producing varieties that give high yields under conditions of high fertility; second, there was an apparently discontinuous jump in the productivity of the breeding pro­ gram due to the introduction of Mexican genetic material; third, there was a large increase in the quantity of inputs devoted to wheat breeding; finally, there were a number of changes in the organization and quality of the inputs which enhanced their productivity. The importance of the Mexican genetic material becomes clear when one realizes that all of the varieties of wheat released after Dirk are either introductions from Mexico or were developed from the cross-breed­ ing of Mexican and Pakistani material.

The first Mexican material was

brought back to Pakistan in 1958 and a regular stream of materials start­ ed coming in 1960 when several Pakistani breeders returned from a year's training in Mexico.

In addition to improved varieties, promising

F^s and later segregating generations which had been bred in Mexico were sent over for selection and testing under Pakistani conditions.

The

first two high yielding varieties to be released to the cultivators were Lerma Rojo and Penjamo-65.

They were improved Mexican varieties, which

had been tested extensively under Pakistani conditions before being re­ leased. They were very high-yielding but their red grain color and low quality grain made them unpopular with the farmers. to be released was Mexipak.

The next variety

It was received from the wheat program in

-212-

Mexico in 1962 and officially released in 1968.

It had the same high-

yielding characteristics as the two previous Mexicans and in addition had the amber colored grain preferred by Pakistanis.

It became the main

commercial variety of the Punjab replacing the older tall varieties on 136 about 70 percent of the wheat acreage in just three years.

It soon

became susceptible to several new types of rust but before these rusts became a serious problem the local hybridization program of crossing Mexican and local wheats had developed several rust resistant varie­ ties — Chenab-70 and Barani-70.

The latter variety was the first to be

bred for rainfed conditions . In 1971 two short duration varieties SA-42 and Blue Silver were released to be used for late planting after a summer crop.

Two years after their release they also were found to be

susceptible to a new type of rust which attacked all commercial varie­ ties.

In 1973 "three new wheat varieties selected from the segregating

materials received from CIMMYT and one variety developed from the local program resistant to the complete prevalent race spectrum...were multi­ plied and released as specific purposed varieties.

These are, Lyallpur-

73, for early planting, Sandal and PARI for mid season and Pothwar for 137 rainfed areas." This increased output was not due simply to the new genetic material which raised the productivity of wheat research. the quality and quantity of inputs were also required.

Increases in

In fact a look

at Table 3-13 leads to some doubt whether there was any shift in the productivity of wheat research at all.

Column 2 shows the annual number

of new crosses made by wheat breeders in the Punjab and provides prob-

TABLE 3-13

Average Annual Number of New Crosses of Wheat

Year (1)

1926 1931-35 1948-50 1953-55 1957-59 1960-62 1963-65 1966-68 1960 1974-75

Annual Average Number of Crosses (2)

3 9 21 23 91 257 215 512 1400 2751

Total Varieties Released (3) 2

3 2

0 0 3 2

Sources: 1926: M.A. Aziz, Cereals and Pulses; Resume of Fifty Years Research Work at Punjab Agricultural College and Research Institute, Lyallpur (Lahore, Ripon Press, 1960).

ably the best single measure of the actual work being done by breeders and their staff.

138

Clearly more time and inputs were going into breeds

ing during the Green Revolution than previously.

Column 3 gives the

total number of varieties released in the row of the crosses from which they were developed.

The table shows continuously diminishing returns

to hybridization despite the introduction of exotic material at various times.

It took just three crosses in the 1920s to come up with two

important varieties C-591 and C-518.

The hybrids which resulted from the

1940s program required almost 10 crosses a year and two new wheat sub­ stations to produce 3 improved hybrids.

After Independence 20 new

crosses per year produced 0-271 and C-273 and over 200 a year were re­ quired to develop the 5 hybrids developed locally out of Mexican and Palistani material. There was a considerable increase in the quantity and quality of the human input that went into the wheat breeding effort after 1960.

In

the early stages of Pakistan's involvement with the Rockefeller's wheat program in Mexico the main external contribution other than genetic material was training Pakistani breeders in modern methods of picking the varieties to cross and screening the segregating material and making them aware of the potential of the Mexican varieties. In 1965 an agreement on the "Accelerated wheat Improvement Program for Pakistan" was signed by the Government of West Pakistan, CIMMYT, and the Ford Foundation,

Pakistan

agreed to double its expenditure on wheat research. CIMMYT would provide a senior scientist to be recident consultant, short-term consultants when

-215-

needed, training for Pakistani scientists in Mexico, and the most advanced seed stocks.

The Ford Foundation would cover the foreign

139 exchange costs of the CIMMYT provisions and project equipment. The effect of this program on the Punjab has been to more than double the number of people working on wheat.

In 1963 there was one

cereal botanist, one assistant botanist, and six research assistants who concentrated on

140 wheat.

By 1972 there were 3 cereal botanists,

141 5 assistant botanists and 12 research assistants breeding wheat. level of the training they had received had also improved.

The

In the former

group there were no Ph.D.s and two people who had received training in Mexico, while in the latter 6 or the 8 botanists had Ph.D.s and four 142 others had been trained in Mexico.

In the early 1970s research

stations were set up in the nothern barani area at Rawapindi and the extreme southern part of the Punjab in Bahawalpur.

These stations not

only tested the varieties developed in Lyallpur and elsewhere, but also had active breeding programs headed by botanists. Another possible source of increased output was the change in the organizational structure of wheat research.

Due at least in part to

the efforts of the Mexican scientist in Pakistan,four changes in the structure took place.

First, the research institutes in the Sind,

Northwest frontier Province, and Punjab agreed to pool wheat research materials, wheat data, and scientific staff.

Secondly, research was

organized around the crop rather than by discipline, so that a breeder, agronomist, soil chemist, entomologist, pathologist, and food technol­

-216-

ogist would all work together on wheat. Third, microplot, fertilizer trails and semi-commercial trails of the best varieties were set up in farmers' fields by the research staff. of their time on private farms ,

This required them to spend much

forced

them to be aware of the demands

of the growers and was possibly the most important government extension program.

Finally, the research staffs were supposed to coordinate efforts 14

with extension services in order to bring closer relations between them. This last however, may have been the least successful of the organiza­ tional reforms.

There is evidence that the first three changes were

instituted successfully although there is no concrete evidence that they raised the productivity of the wheat research program. The Green Revolution then was started by the introduction of Mexi­ can wheat varieties with little increase in wheat research investment. Mexipak was important both as the variety which initiated the increased yields and increased production which was termed the Green Revolution, but also because it opened the eyes of policy makers within

Pakistan

to the potential returns to investment in agricultural research.

The

government was willing to support the research structure by providing money for the increased inputs described above.

It was this increase

in inputs that produced the disease resistant varieties which have pre­ vented the Green Revolution from turning into a rust disaster. Overall,the basic aims have remained the same—to increase the yield per acre and secondarily to produce high quality grain.

The path to this

ultimate goal has changed with the techniques and costs of breeding, the price of other inputs in the grain production process, and the genetic

-217-

material available.

Hence the early aim was to produce high yielding,

good quality grain for canal irrigated land.

When this program met with

success, they moved on to breeding for barani areas and attempting to breed in disease resistance. .The world wide decrease in fertilizer prices and foreign aid-giving agencies shifts the attention of breeders in Pakistan to stiff-stemmed varieties, which would not lodge under high doses of fertilizer.

The stiff stem had been one of their aims since

the beginning of hybridization, but the decrease in fertilizer prices, the increased availability of fertilizer, and then the example of Mexico seems to have greatly increased their interest in this characteristic. The increased use of Mexipak and fertilizer,which led to the increased susceptibility t.o disease has brought breeders back to the goal of rust resistance.

Now the increased price of fertilizer and the apparent

difficulty of getting fertilizer to the small farmers, has led the most successful wheat breeder in Pakistan to advocate the development of intermediate wheat technology.

He would develop varieties that give

146 higher yields than Mexicans with medium doses of fertilizer. The most useful way to summarize wheat development is again to examine

Table 3-12 in terms of our supply side model.

The varieties

released in the period before Independence fit very nicely into this model.

P-ll and 8-A are the result of the selection stage of the model;

C-518 and C-591 are the result of stage three, breeding by hybridization; and C-228, C-217, and C-250 were due to a combination of the use of exotic genetic material in the hybridization process and testing on re­ search sub-stations outside Lyallpur.

However, for the period after

-218-

Independence our model of the supply side changes is not as useful. The lack of new varieties in the late 1940s and 1950s may be a case of diminishing returns because of unchanging technology.

Another important

factor was the departure of the entire staff at Partition.

The large

group of varieties released during the mid-1960s is the only truly exo­ genous shift in the productivity of wheat research since the introduction of pure-line breeding.

Although it clearly did require a large increase

in time, effort and money to develop the varieties that prevented a rust epidemic, the record of the period from 1947 to 1964 gives little reason to believe that many new varieties would have been produced without the new genetic material and the training and support from Mexico. Shifts in demand have not led directly to new varieties like they did in cotton.

There seems to have been little work which was due to

pressure from farmers except perhaps the development of the rainfed varie­ ties 9-D, C-217 and Pothwar.

The demand for yield-increasing varieties

remained constant, but new ways of satisfying that demand became avail­ able to researchers with the introduction of the Mexican genetic material.

iii.

Other Crops

Can the patterns found in the development of wheat and cotton be generalized? Do these in wheat and cotton suggest an explanation for the fact that many new varieties were produced in some crops and none in other?

Can they explain the greater number of new varieties in irrigated

vs. unirrigated crops?

The histories of the other main crops must be

examined to answer these questions.

The two main results of the wheat

-219-

and cotton case studies were:

first, the model of technological re­

search in which a change from one stage to the next led

to an increase

in output of new varieties followed by diminishing returns to breeding efforts is an important explanatory factor; second, fluctuations in the supply of inputs or shifts in the demand for varieties also have import­ ant effects on the quantity of output. To test the usefulness of the stages of supply model Table 3-14 and Figure 3.3 have been constructed.

Column two in Table 3-14 gives

the year when surveys of the local varieties were undertaken and the selection process began.

In self-fertilizing crops single plant selec­

tion was used while mass selection was used for the cross-fertilized crops.

The years under the column headed by hybridization refers to the

year when artificial cross-pollination was first used by breeders to try to improve the crop. The years under the Regional Breeding heading refer to the year when the scientist trying to develop a specific crop began doing breeding work in more than one agro-climatic zone.

Sugar­

cane is not included in this table because the scientists of the Punjab played no role in the breeding process,,

They tested the varieties

deyeloped in the Coimbatore research station but because of the climate of the Punjab were not able to do any breeding. Figure 3.2a shows that in the next 5 to 10 years after the initia­ tion of the selection programs shown in Table 3-14 new varieties had been released by the DAP in all crops except desi cotton.

Figure 3.2b

indicates that the same type of relationship holds for crops in which there have been large hybridization programs.

The other crops which are

listed as having hybridization programs in Table 3-14 but are not in

TABLE 3-14 First Use of Breeding Techniques

Crop A.

Selection

Regional Breeding

Self-Fertilized Wheat Desi Cotton American Cotton Gram Rice Barley Linseed

B.

Hybridization

1907 1908 1908 Between 1915 and 1920 1927 1920 1930

1926 1930 1935* 1937 1933 1930

1936 1935 1935 Before 1933 1960s

Cross-Fertilized Bajra Jowar Oilseeds (Toria & Sarson)

1929 1929 1930

1939 After 1941 1933"

1936

Maize

1930s

1946 and 1950

1960s

Sources:

Wheat, rice, gram, barley, bajra, jowar, maize: II.A. Aziz, Cereals and Pulses, Resume of Fifty Years Research Work at Punjab Agricultural College and Research Institute, Lyallpur (Lahore, Ripon Press, 1960). Cotton: S.M. Sikka and A.B. Joshi, "Breeding" in Cotton in India, Vol. I (Bombay, ICCC, 1960).

TABLE 3-14 (cont'd)

Oilseeds:

"Oilseed Crops and Tobacco," in Fifty Years of Research Work at Punjab Agricultural College and Research Institute Lyallpur (Lahore, Ripon Press, 1960).

*

Sustained breeding program began in 1943. **

Hybrids were for experimental purposes rather than part of a breeding program.

FIGURE 3.2a Lag Between First Use of Selection Techniques and Release of An Improved Crop Variety

5-Year Lag

Year Selection First Used

10-Year Lag

1950

1940

1930

1920

1910

AC*

1900

DC

1910

1920

1940

1930

Year of Release

AC DC B B.

-

G M R W J

American Cotton Desi Cotton Barley Bajra

J

-222-

- Gram - Maize -Rice - Wheat - Jowar

1950

FIGURE 3.2b Lag Between First Use of Hybridization and the Release of An Improved Crop Variety

Year Hybridization First Used

1950 •M. AC

1940

(DC)

1930

1920

1910

'*•/ 5-Year Lag "jc 10-Year Lag

1900

1910

1920

19.30

1940

Year Variety Released

M AC G DC W

-

Maize American Cotton Gram Desi Cotton Wheat

-223-

1950 1960

-224-

Figure 3.2b — rice, barley, bajra, jowar, and oilseeds