Daily Times

The cooperation between China and Pakistan in the collection and identification of cotton germplasm resources is of great pith and moment,” said Prof Du Xiongming, Director of Cotton Germplasm Resources Division, Institute of Cotton Research (ICR) of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS).

“For now the two countries have exchanged over 300 cotton germplasm resources,” China Economic Net reported on Tuesday quoting Dr Du. As per Prof Du, China and Pakistan have been co-working for many years in the field of collecting and identifying cotton germplasm resources. ICR has joined hands with Cotton Research Institute (CCRI), Multan, University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) and some other universities and scientific research institutions to identify cotton germplasms’ resistance to heat, drought, diseases and insect pests in different places and environments, and jointly published scientific research papers on that.

In addition, through the Industry-University-Research (IUR) cooperation, ICR has been devoted to the training of talented Pakistanis in the field of basic cotton research.

Prof Du’s laboratory has trained 11 Pakistani doctoral students (including 5 graduates), 2 postdocs and 2 visiting scholars so far. Cotton germplasm resources are the material basis of basic and applied research of cotton. “Pakistan’s Asiatic Cotton (G. arboreum) is different from China’s Gossypium hirsutum Linn in term terms of genetic characteristics.”

According to Prof Du, the prevention and control of many major diseases and insect pests are very much related to the research of germplasm resources. For example, that in Asia and Africa the major disease of cotton is caused by CLCV, and this virus devastated the Pakistan cotton industry in early 1990s where it caused an estimated yield reduction of 30-35%.

If Asiatic Cotton (G. arboreum)’s genetic characteristics of resistance to CLCV can be transferred into Gossypium hirsutum Linn. via distant hybridization, the problem caused by CLCV that has troubled Pakistani cotton farmers for many years will be solved.

Being in the industry for over 30 years, Du has published 39 SCI papers in the journal Nature Genetics as the first or corresponding author. “Compared with Pakistan, China’s germplasm resources research is more comprehensive and systematic, and has advanced from phenotypic identification to genotypic identification,” he mentioned.