Cuba commits to new technologies for varietal sugarcane program

SANCTI SPIRITUS, Cuba, Jan 4 (ACN) The National Sugarcane Hybridization Center, the only one of its kind in Cuba, located in the province of Sancti Spiritus(central region), is committed to improving the work of crossbreeding with the blooms of the grass in the mountains and the plains to strengthen the nation's sugarcane varietal program, vital for the development of sugar contests.

PhD in Sciences Victor Caraballoso Torrecilla, rector of the crossbreeding activity in the institution, told the Cuban News Agency that the island is the only country where several geographical scenarios are used to synchronize sugarcane blooms, which allows obtaining and enhancing early, medium and late maturing varieties that respond to the peculiarities of Cuban harvests.

For this, he argued, flowers are obtained in cane fields located 400 meters above sea level, where there is a good process of floral induction but with a slower growth of flowers; meanwhile, he meant the benefits of these mountainous scenarios where there are cool temperatures and humidity levels ideal for profuse flowering.

The flowers grown in the mountains are transported to the Casa de Cruzamientos ("Crossbreeding House"), where high temperatures favor good seed formation and the development of the already fertilized flower, a process that is complemented with the use of male progenitors typical of the plains obtained in the area.

This process guarantees better nutrition to the flowering stalks, ensures more seeds and better seed maturation in each one and triples the production of seedlings, an achievement impossible with the traditional technique of using only chemical solutions at this stage.

All this technology, from the use of different geographic scenarios to obtain the flowers to the incorporation of the margullo to the stalks in the hybridization house, makes it possible to carry out the crosses that are desired in the sugarcane varieties that flower, 80 % of the existing ones, and we are the only ones with the possibility of crossing early and late varieties of sugarcane because we have the locations for those blooms, the expert concluded.