White hybrid corn outyields open-pollinated varieties

CATAINGAN, Masbate – Farmers of this province were presented with new options on farming technologies during the recently concluded On-Farm Re-search organized by the Depart-ment of Agriculture – Bicol Integrated Agricultural Research Center (DA-BIARC), together with Pioneer Hi-Bred Philippines, and the local government of the municipality.

The main objective of this go-vernment project is to compare the yield performance of Pioneer’s new 30W30 white hybrid corn va-riety with the current open-pol-linated varieties (OPVs) or native corn, which is traditionally being planted by corn farmers of the province.

Upon harvesting all crops in the field demonstration, Pioneer 30W30 obtained an averaged yield of 6.7 metric tons per hectare com-pared to the OPV, which recorded only 3.9 metric tons per hectare.

The 30W30 variety, disting-uished by its flint snow white grains and thick husk cover, is known to have very good drought tolerance and resistance to least rust and ear rot based on previous trials conducted by agronomy and research personnel. Aside from its good eating quality, the corn crop matures at 105-108 days and has a high milling and grit recovery rate.

Jet Parma, Pioneer Business Manager, praised the agriculture department’s regional office and the government for its commitment to technology-based agricultural productivity for the Filipino farmer.

"Pioneer has been exerting much effort to present new op-tions to our farmers, one of which is the actual field demonstration of hybrid corn and traditional varieties to compare yield differ-ence," said Parma. "When farmers see for themselves the perfor-mance of both varieties, they would be in a better position of choosing which available farming technologies can potentially pro-vide them with a higher income."

Pioneer Hi-Bred Philippines, a wholly owned subsidiary of Iowa-based Pioneer Hi-Bred Internatio-nal, Inc. – a DuPont company – is the country’s leading producer and distributor of high-quality hybrid seed corn.

DuPont is a science company. Founded in 1802, DuPont puts science to work by solving problems and creating solutions that make people’s lives better, safer and easier. It operates in more than 70 countries.