Topic
breeding
Commodities Gene-Edited Seedless Blackberries and Cherries Vie to Reinvent Global Agriculture
Pairwise, a North Carolina startup, is using Crispr gene editing to develop seedless, thornless, higher-yielding blackberry plants, according to WIRED. The company has received more than 50 regulatory approvals for five edited crops in nine countries, but only one product for sale: a blackberry variety in Colombia. Analysts remain reluctant to predict success amid consumer backlash risks.
Commodities ICAR unveils India's first fully annotated T2T pigeonpea genome to speed pulse breeding
ICAR has developed India's first fully annotated telomere-to-telomere (T2T) reference genome of pigeonpea variety 'Asha', spanning 752.65 million base pairs across all 11 chromosomes. The milestone, deposited in NCBI as NIPB_CcT2T_4, is expected to accelerate climate-resilient, high-yielding pulse breeding and support India's Mission for Aatmanirbharta in Pulses.
Commodities Dorper and Texel Genetics to Boost Local Mutton Output in Jammu and Kashmir
The Jammu and Kashmir government has imported 900 exotic sheep—450 Dorper and 450 Texel—from Australia under the Holistic Agriculture Development Programme to boost local mutton production. The breeds, known for rapid growth and high meat yield, will be used for cross-breeding with local sheep to narrow the region's significant production-consumption gap. The initiative aims to achieve self-reliance in mutton production and benefit local farmers.