Zinc and Provitamin A Biofortified Maize Genotypes Exhibited Potent to Reduce Hidden—Hunger in Nepal

• Published in: Plants (Basel) Vol. 11; no. 21; p. 2898
• Main Authors: Dhakal, Krishna, Magar, Amar Bahadur Pun, Pokhrel, Keshab Raj, Baral, Bandhu Raj, Beshir, Abdurahman, Shrestha, Hari Kumar, Vista, Shree Prasad
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 01.10.2022; MDPI
• Subjects: Agricultural production; Carotenoids; Corn; Crop diseases; Enriched foods; Environmental aspects; Fertilizers; Food; Genetic aspects; Genotype; Genotypes; Harvest; hidden hunger; Hunger; Infections; Kernels; Lattice design; Legumes; Mortality; multi-stress tolerance; Nitrogen; Nutrient deficiency; Nutritional aspects; Potassium; provitamin A; Public health; Seasons; Seeds; three-way cross maize; Vitamin A; Women; Zinc; Zinc in the body; Nigeria; Nepal; Sub-Saharan Africa; Asia
• ISSN: 2223-7747; 2223-7747
• DOI: 10.3390/plants11212898

Zinc deficiency affects one third of the population worldwide, and vitamin A deficiency is a prevalent public health issue in Sub-Saharan Africa and South-Asia, including Nepal. Crop biofortification is the sustainable solution to these health—related problems, thus we conducted two different field trials in an alpha lattice design to identify zinc and provitamin A biofortified maize genotypes consistent and competitive in performance over the contrasting seasons (Season 1: 18 February to 6 July 2020 and Season 2: 31 August to 1 February, 2020/21). In our study, the performance of introduced maize genotypes (zinc—15 and provitamin A biofortified—24) were compared with that of the local check, focusing on the overall agro-morphology, yield attributes, yield, and kernel zinc and total carotenoid content. Zinc and total carotenoid in the tested genotypes were found in the range between 14.2 and 24.8 mg kg−1 and between 1.8 and 3.6 mg 100 g−1. Genotypes A1831-8 from zinc and EEPVAH-46 from provitamin A biofortified maize trial recorded kernel zinc and total carotenoid as high as 52.3, and 79.5%, respectively, compared to the local check (DMH849). The provitamin A genotypes EEPVAH-46 and EEPVAH-51 (total carotenoid: 3.6 and 3.3 mg 100 g−1), and zinc biofortified genotypes A1847-10 and A1803-42 (20.4 and 22.4 mg kg−1 zinc) were identified as superior genotypes based on their yield consistency over the environments and higher provitamin A and zinc content compared to the check. In addition, farmers can explore August sowing to harvest green cobs during December-January to boost up the emerging green cob business.