Agronomy of seed tuber production for an indigenous potato cultivar 'PARS-70' bred in Pakistan

Current potato production in Pakistan is largely based on imported seed of exotic cultivars. An indigenous cultivar PARS-70 has been approved and released for cultivation. An agronomic package was needed for seed multiplication of PARS-70. Experiments were carried out to evaluate the effect of seed weight, spacing, and depth of planting. Data were collected on emergence, growth and yield characters. The conventionally autumn-to-autumn produced seed was compared with the seed derived from microtubers. The yields were significantly different at different planting spaces. The total number of tubers and number of small tubers were highest at the shallow planting, and which decreased with increased planting depth. The conventional seed produced more vigorous plants than the plants derived from tissue culture origin, but the differences between two categories of seed were nonsignificant. Seed potatoes of PARS-70 could be stored at room temperature for several months. But, the yields from room stored seeds were significantly lower than the cold stored seed.