In 2001, Vietnam produced about 2,200,000 metric tons of maize grain in an acreage of 730,000 hectares. About 80 percent of the maize produced in the country (plus 100,000 tons of maize imported annually) are used for animal feeds. Since the last decade, the area under maize, yield and production per annum have increased by 1.7 times, 2 times and 3.3 times, respectively. About 60 percent of hybrid seeds were produced by the domestic organizations. However, in comparison with other countries, grain yield is still below the average with high input costs, and the production is uneven and unstable in different regions. The Vietnamese Government has planned to enhance maize production by 2005 to 4-5 million tons with maize planting areas to climb to about 1.2 million hectares (90 percent of which will be grown with hybrids). For this purpose, besides improvement in yields, maize production must deal with problem of drought, soil acidity or salinity, nitrogen deficiency, early maturity, lodging and disease resistance. One of the effective tools to solve these problems is application of biotechnology approaches in maize breeding. Recently, the Agricultural Genetics Institute (AGI) and National Maize Research Institute (NMRI) conducted maize biotechnology research, mainly in the fields of anther and ovary culture and characterization of genetic diversity. Both the Institutes have also planned to carry out a program of collaborative biotechnology research on mapping of drought tolerance in maize, analysis of genetic diversity in maize germplasm for heterotic prediction, as well as application of molecular markers for developing quality protein maize (QPM).

English

0501|AGRIS 0501|AL-Maize Program

Juan Carlos Mendieta

CIMMYT Publications Collection