Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
resources, with a de
competitive-
ness by producing more rice with lower costs, less environmental foot-
print, more stability, and higher quality, all basic factors for eco-
ef
ned goal of improving rice farmers
'
ciency (Zorrilla et al. 2013).
Since its creation, the main goal of FLAR has been to develop a
cooperative and ef
cient breeding program, aimed at producing and
releasing new improved cultivars that could raise yield potential and
improve tolerance of several biotic and abiotic stresses, as well as agro-
nomic and grain quality traits. This program is based at CIAT head-
quarters in Palmira, Colombia, but FLAR
'
s breeding programs are
financially and technically independent from the genetic research proj-
ects of CIAT, though a strong collaboration exists between these two
institutions. Having CIAT as a principal partner gives the FLAR program
immediate access to all genetic improvements obtained by CIAT. FLAR
breeders introduce new materials, make many hundreds of crosses per
year, and produce and select elite breeding lines (FL lines) that are then
distributed by VIOFLAR nurseries to FLARmembers. They evaluate and
further select these FL lines in their own environments, and, if appro-
priate, register and release new cultivars. This breeding network is more
coherent and successful than previous breeding efforts in which new
lines were freely distributed to any interested institution with no invest-
ment from the users. With FLAR, each partner invests resources in this
program, and not only requests materials but also intervenes to deter-
mine the breeding strategy. Feedback from partners is very important
and must be improved because the average data recovery fromVIOFLAR
trials is only
60% and, if it were higher, it would help FLAR
'
s breeders
∼
to
fine-tune their breeding plans (Zorrilla et al. 2013).
This integrated effort has well-de
ned roles, with CIAT doing
upstream research looking for new genes, using interspeci
c hybridiza-
tion, and developing new breeding tools, among others. FLAR intro-
duces and blends new materials and selects and distributes promising
lines at the end of its pipeline to each of
30 FLAR member institutions.
National partners select and identify new improved rice cultivars using
FLAR
>
s germplasm throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. The
program is subdivided into tropical and temperate regions. The common
breeding objectives in both subprograms include high yield potential,
resistance to
Pyricularia
sp. and other fungal diseases, resistance to
lodging, high milling and cooking quality, and tolerance of delayed
harvest. For the tropics, the program also looks for resistance to RHBV
and its insect vector. For the temperate region, tolerance of low temper-
atures is an important selection factor. Cold tolerance at the seedling
stage is needed for early planting in the Southern Cone to match
'
