Forest tree improvement in India

Abstract

Forest tree breeding is relatively a young science. Even so, there is good evidence of its potentiality for increasing forest productivity and quality of the forest produce. The basic scheme for forest tree improvement involves selection of superior parent trees, assembling them as clones in seed orchards in special designs to promote maximum cross pollination among the different clones and reduce inbreeding. Interprovenance and interspecific hybridisation are also resorted to in special situations. Forest tree improvement work through selection and breeding has been in progress in India for the last nearly two decades. Some of the achievements and strategies used are briefly reviewed.