Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Guatemala are clustered, with yields of 2 to 3 t ha 1 . Panama and
Guatemala have increased their grain yield since 1996, but this tend-
ency has been more pronounced for Panama, as grain yield in Guate-
mala has decreased since 2000. In Panama,
40,000 ha of rice were
cultivated under the family farming system, in which grain yields were
0.83 t ha 1 ,while
62,650 ha were cultivated with modern technol-
ogy and improved cultivars, for which average yield was 5.6 t ha 1 in
2011
-
2012 (MIDA 2012).
1. Interinstitutional Collaboration. Some of the rice breeding programs
in the region were born and evolved with the contributions of the
CIAT Rice Program. The generation and distribution of improved rice
germplasm have made a huge impact on national agricultural research
programs and among the rice producers of the region that use both
irrigated and rainfed cultivation. These national rice breeding programs
are small and modest, focusing on the introduction, multilocation eval-
uation, and selection of superior germplasm coming initially from IRRI
and then from the CIAT Rice Program. The network called IRTP (Interna-
tional Rice Testing Program for Latin America and the Caribbean), which
provided an opportunity to observe various specialist nurseries such as
VIRAL, VIOAL, VIPAL, and VIAVAL, effectively ful
lled its objective,
allowing the provision of improved germplasm to meet the demand for
genetic material that was tolerant of biotic stresses (Rosero 1978). The
IRTP was later renamed INGER-LAC (International Network for Genetic
Evaluation of Rice for Latin America and the Caribbean). Another aspect
was the regional advanced germplasm exchange of national programs,
known as the Central American Rice Nursery (VICA), which was impor-
tant in the selection and generation of new cultivars with adaptation to
the growing conditions of the region. Through this mechanism, Central
America con
rmed the good performance of the cross CT 8008, which led
to the cultivars ICTA Pazos in Guatemala and Universidad 3189, IDIAP
L-7, and IDIAP 38 in Panama. The latter one represented 18.6% of the
cultivated area in 2012 (MIDA 2012).
Another remarkable example of horizontal collaboration on germplasm
exchange is related to an agreement made from 1982 to 1988 between
CIAT and the Agricultural Research Institute of Panama (IDIAP) and the
Faculty of Agricultural Sciences (FCA) of the University of Panama
(Martínez et al. 1998a,b). The main objective was to obtain improved
rice germplasm under irrigated and favorable rainfed conditions. It also
allowed the establishment of a
flow of genetic material, which linked
various screening sites in Panama with the CIAT Rice Program and the
international rice tests of Latin America and the Caribbean. The results
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