Improving chickpea yield by incorporating resistance to ascochyta blight.

Area of Science:

• Plant breeding
• Crop pathology
• Agronomy

Background:

• Ascochyta blight (Ascochyta rabiei) is a major chickpea disease.
• Resistant cultivars are key to managing Ascochyta blight.
• A long-term breeding program aimed to develop improved chickpea varieties.

Purpose of the Study:

• To breed chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) cultivars resistant to Ascochyta blight.
• To incorporate high-yield potential and desirable agronomic traits.
• To address the needs of growers in Mediterranean blight-endemic areas.

Main Methods:

• Initiated a breeding program in 1977-78 at ICARDA, Syria.
• Utilized pedigree and F4-derived family breeding methods.
• Conducted selection in artificially created blight epidemics and off-season nurseries for trait refinement.

Main Results:

• Developed 1584 Ascochyta blight-resistant chickpea lines.
• Identified lines with diverse maturity, plant height, and seed size.
• Achieved 33% higher seed yield in new cultivars compared to resistant sources.
• Confirmed yield loss of 340 kg ha(-1) per blight severity class increase.

Conclusions:

• Breeding for Ascochyta blight resistance significantly improves chickpea yield.
• Developed lines offer growers new options for blight-endemic regions.
• Winter sowing of chickpea became feasible, with potential to double production.
• Twenty-three resistant cultivars have been released in 11 countries.