Rapeseed (Brassica rapa and B. napus) and mustard (B. juncea) are the important crop of Brassica group grown as oilseed crops in Pakistan. These have remained one of the major sources of oil in the sub-continent for centuries. Rapeseed and mustard are rich source of oil and contains 44-46% good quality oil. In addition, its meal has 38-40% protein that has a complete profile of amino acids including lysine, methionine and cystine. The meal from canola quality rapeseed varieties is an excellent feed for animals and birds especially for poultry. The improvement in processing and refining techniques have enabled to extend the use of rapeseed and mustard oil as cooking medium, salad ingredient, shortening and in margarine. Recent development of canola quality mustard further enhanced the use of mustard oil for edible purpose. The brassica crops are mostly cultivated on soils having pH 7.0 - 8.0 (6)
Rapeseed (Brassica napus L.) being traditional oilseed crops of Pakistan are grown over large area in all the four provinces of the country under both irrigated and rainfed conditions (7)
In Pakistan, it is grown over an area of about 0.23 million ha but its production per unit area is merely 803 kg ha-1(9). Pakistan is facing chronic edible oil shortage. Domestic production of edible oil from all traditional and non-traditional oilseeds is only sufficient to meet about one fourth of local demand, remaining requirement is met through heavy imports (9). There are many factors responsible for low yield, but the most important one is the non availability of high yielding varieties. It is, therefore, imperative to develop improved varieties of oilseed Brassica to bridge the gap between local production and import of edible oil in the country (10).
The rapeseed (Toria, Sarson and Canola/Gobi Sarson) and mustard (Raya, Peela raya and Taramira) are traditional oilseed crops and are being grown in this region for centuries. The crop was grown on an area of about 272,100 ha with a production of 230,000 tons annually with average yield of 812 kg/ha (6)
(5) conducted cultivar performance trials with canola (low eroic acid) quality rape cultivars in 1990-91 at 5 locations in Georgia.
Its average yield is 839 kg ha-1, which is very low as compared to other advanced countries. The European countries have a yield level of 3500 kg ha-1, Canada 3200 kg ha-1 and Australia 2000 kg ha-1 (8).
The study was conducted to find out,
1. Screening of germ plasm for high yield, drought tolerant, disease resistant lines suitable for barani areas
2. Screening of advance lines from different institutes for adoptability under climatic conditions of Kohat division