Giant cassava: scientist develops improved tuber – 7/2/2023 – Market

Born in Egypt, scientist Nagib Nassar, 85, is trying to take a larger variety of cassava to Paraíba, capable of producing more flour, starch and other products. According to him, who is an emeritus professor at UnB (University of Brasília), the roots of the tuber are three to four times the size of a common variety.

Cassava was named chimera. In Greek mythology, the term is given to a monster whose appearance reveals a hybrid of several animals. In Nassar’s research, in turn, the name indicates that the tuber combines characteristics of two compatible varieties –one of them is wild and the other cultivated– which were put in contact so that they could synthesize the new cassava, without any type of sexual crossing. .

“The chimera stimulates the production of roots. We increase the size of the root and, then, increase the production of starch, flour, starch. We would increase the national production two or three times”, says Nassar.

According to the researcher, the idea is that, together with other varieties of cassava improved by the researcher, chimera cuttings will be taken to five farmers in Paraíba after the dry period of winter this year. The purpose is to increase local production.

For this, the professor claims to have submitted the project to the Ministry of Agrarian Development. According to him, negotiations are still at the beginning and there is still much to be organized. wanted by Sheetthe folder says that there is still nothing concrete that can be disclosed about the initiative.

The chimeras were developed about eight years ago, according to Nassar, and will be propagated to farmers.

According to the scientist, flour mills should also be chosen to receive instructions on how to enrich cassava flour using the tuber leaf. The addition, he says, is capable of raising the protein content from 1% to 9%.

In her master’s degree, completed in 2019, agronomist Deziany da Silva Ferreira, 28, used the chimeras developed by Nassar, her co-advisor at the time, among the cassava varieties analyzed by the project. At the end of the experiment, she found that the chimeras had good resistance to nematodes, microscopic worms that damage plant roots, and were also able to transfer resistance from one variety to another in a short period of time.

According to Ferreira, the research was sponsored by Funagib, a foundation created by Nassar to promote and subsidize, with its own resources, research on cassava.

“It was very interesting work. It is very important, especially for Africa, which uses manioc a lot for manufacture”, she says.

The foundation was created by Nassar after he was awarded the Kuwait International Prize of Environment in 2014 for his research on cassava improvement. The scientist received US$ 100,000 (about R$ 250,000 at the time).

In Brazil for almost 50 years, Nassar came to the country in 1974 to study the cassava culture in the region. He collected and cataloged wild varieties and helped, even in the last century, to develop a hybrid resistant to African mosaic, a pest that devastated tuber plantations in African countries and caused famine in the region.

Outside academia, the genetic improvement of cassava has been part of the research carried out by the IAC (Agronomic Institute), of the Secretariat of Agriculture and Supply of the State of São Paulo, since the 1930s, according to José Carlos Feltran, a researcher at the institution.

He claims that the development of a new improved variety can take more than 12 years and cost from US$ 1 million to US$ 2 million (about R$ 4.8 million to R$ 9.7 million). “The team involved, the physical structure, which includes buildings, laboratories, farms, vehicles, etc., and the salary of the people at that time are considered. Who finances this is the public power”, he says.

Unlike the technique used by professor Nagib, cassava improvement at IAC crosses varieties. Feltran explains that, from this, a selection is made at each planting with the plants resulting from that fertilization until a new variety with the desired characteristics is found.

To date, 24 new varieties have been released to farmers by the IAC, according to Feltran, some for table use (human consumption) and others for industry.

“Cassava, for industry, has as its main point the production of flour and starch. It has high productivity, resistance to bacteriosis, a high content of dry matter in the roots, which results in a high yield of flour and starch in the industry, and high hydrocyanic acid content, which forms cyanide, present in the root. These varieties are not suitable for human consumption”, he explains.

The last variety of cassava cataloged by the IAC, in 2021, has 680 to 800 international units of vitamin A per hundred grams of root, according to Feltran – more than triple that observed in another previous variety.