उत्‍तर पश्‍चि‍मी मैदानो के लिए जौं  की उन्‍नत किस्‍में

The annual requirement of barley for malting purposes is on continuous rise in recent years. With the growing urbanization, open economy and changing lifestyles demand for quality malt and malt products has increased in last two decades in India. Malt is being utilized for brewing, distillation, baby foods, confectionaries, cocoa-malt drinks and medicinal syrups etc. Barley cultivation for malting purposes is mostly confined to the north western plains in Rajasthan, western Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab states in India. Under some areas of these states where rabi sowings are delayed due to late harvest of previous kharif crops like cotton, sugarcane, sorghum and pearl millet, such areas can be put under malt barley cultivation by farmers.

Keeping in mind, the late sown requirement of the farmers of north western plains, two short duration malt barley varieties viz. DWRB 73 (two-row type malt barley) and DWRUB 64 (six-row type) were developed. These varieties were released and notified by the “Central Sub-Committee on Crop Standards, Notification and Release of Varieties for Agricultural Crops (CVRC)” in 2011 and 2012, respectively for irrigated late sown conditions of North Western Plains Zone (NWPZ). These varieties can be fitted well in potential areas of barley cultivation under late sown conditions in different states in north western plains under different crop rotations.

Under coordinated varietal evaluation trials, DWRB 73 and DWRUB 64 exhibited average grain yield of 3.87 and 4.05 tones/ha, respectively. DWRB 73 was superior in grain yield on three years mean basis over the checks DWRUB 52, RD 2668 and six-row check K 551. Similarly, DWRUB 64 depicted significant superiority in grain yield on four years mean basis over the checks K 551, DWRUB 52 and DWRB 73. Some important quantitative (average), morphological and grain characteristics of DWRB 73 and DWRUB 64 are given below-

 In malting quality analysis, DWRB 73 has shown good overall quality score (15/27) comparable to the best check DWRUB 52 (16/27) and superior to checks viz. RD 2668 (13/27) and K 551 (12/27). On the basis of three years performance, it has specific advantages for important traits like proportion of bold grains (85 %), protein content (12.47 %), hot water extract (76.7 % db), and Kolbach index (0.39). DWRB 73 was also comparable with checks for hectiolitre weight (63 kg), friability (72 %), diastatic power (103 ⁰L) and wort viscosity (1.64 mpas/s).

Similarly, DWRUB 64 has shown advantage in overall quality score (70/108) than the six-row check K 551 (52/108) and two-row checks viz. DWRUB 52 (49/81) and DWRB 73 (30/54). On the basis of four years mean performance, it had better hectiolitre weight (59.2 kg), proportion of bold grains (87.5 %), hot water extract (77.1 % db), malt yield (88.9 %) and wort filtration rate (210.5 ml/hr) over the six-rowed check K 551. In addition, most of the grain and malt trials it has shown comparable performance with two-row type checks DWRUB 52 and DWRB 73, known for better malting quality.

The two new malt barley varieties DWRB 73 and DWRUB 64 are high yielding with excellent malt quality. These are recommended for farmers under irrigated late sown conditions (sowing time 10-25 December) with rotation of previous crops as cotton, sorghum, sugarcane and Pearlmillet etc. Cultivation of these new cultivars DWRB 73 and DWRUB 64 in north western plains under irrigated late sown conditions would provide a better option for farmers under areas, where harvesting of previous kharif crops are delayed. The varieties will also provide quality raw material for malting industries and would uplift socio-economic status of farmers with better returns. 

Authors:

R.P.S. Verma, V. Kumar, B. Sarkar, A.S. Kharub, D. Kumar, R. Selvakumar and I. Sharma

 DIRECTORATE OF WHEAT RESEARCH, KARNAL-132001

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