Rainfed Rice Production and there Germplasm Development in Kenya

Abstract

ice (Oryza Sativa L.) has been grown in Kenya for several centuries and during this time has been locally selected by farmers for adaptation in the dry climate of Kenya highlands and coastal region. this history of selection by farmers has led to the concentration of genetic information for performance under drought conditions in locally-adapted rice types. Since water availability affects many processes in plants, drought tolerance is a complex character and due to the complex nature of the drought tolerance limited progress has been made in breeding for drought tolerance using simple screening methods. To produce drought tolerant cultivars, characters can used as parents in a breeding program, this is a two step process. Obviously, the root system is central to drought tolerance. The root system must be able to remove water efficiently from soils with low moisture and withstand the dynamics of soil during drought conditions will prevent stomata closure and maximise photosynthesis which is essential for high crop production. Over 365 cultivars of rainfed rice have been identified in Kenya and can be used in the two step process as source material for identifying characters related to drought tolerance and as parental lines. To advance the first step, research was conducted to identify drought tolerance characters in rainfed cultivars from Kenya. The study had a total of 580 mm of rainfall which was below the mean precipitation requirement of 750 mm. The drought sensitive variety IR20 was compared with drought tolerant IR52 and five KR (Kenya Rice) KR21, KR22, KR35,KR108 and KR135 cultivars. Plant biomass, plant height, leaf area, leaf length, protein: chlorophyll content ratio and grain yield were affected by limiting water availability and differences between cultivars were noted. The protein to chlorophyll ratio in leaves in the KR. cultivars increase from 18.4 to 28.0 as water deficient increases from -0.8 mpa to -1.4 Mpa allowing these cultivars to maintain relatively higher photosynthetic activities. This accounts for the small change in yield of Kenyan rice cultivars under drought stress conditions compared with the drought sensitive IR20. The Kenyan rice cultivars under drought stress had yields which were reduced by at most 40% of the fully water controls while in IR20 yields were reduced by 79% with drought stress