Quinoa Rehamna Project: High-Yielding Quinoa Cultivars Introduction

Agriculture is facing many challenges such as climate change, drought, and salinity. This calls for urgent interventions to induce fast adaptation and diversification. In this context, the introduction of crops with a high value and a high tolerance to stress such as quinoa would help address two interrelated challenges simultaneously: abiotic stresses that undermine crop production and poverty that impacts the rural poor. The quinoa Rehamna project funded by IDRC and implemented by ICBA and UM6P University in Morocco aims to develop the quinoa value chain toward achieving food and nutritional security of poor rural communities. Several high-yielding quinoa cultivars developed in ICBA have been introduced. Obtained results from the experimental station and on-farm trials show clearly that ICBA cultivars recorded higher yields than local cultivated seeds. Irrigation had a great effect on quinoa productivity as it was increasing for most cultivars by more than three times compared to rainfed conditions. Irrigation along with organic amendment increased yield four times for most of the tested cultivars. Production cost analysis showed that using mechanized production and processing practices combined with irrigation and organic amendment can reduce the cost of quinoa seed production and processing from 2.8 to 1.1 USD/kg compared to manual production system under rainfed conditions. It was concluded that to be more competitive, using mechanized production and processing along with irrigation, organic amendment, and high-yielding cultivars is the key solution to increase productivity, reduce cost and thus reduce the market price.