Vol. 11, Issue 7 (2022)

Author(s):
Aashna Meena and Nilesh Talekar

Abstract:
Rapeseed-mustard is the world's third most important source of vegetable oil in Brassicaceae family and is cultivated in more than 50 countries. As erucic acid and glucosinolate are two main anti-nutrional factor in the oil and seed meal. Canola (00) varieties have oil with less than 2% erucic acid and glucosinolates of less than 30 µ moles/g defatted seed meal and command a premium in the international market. But Indian cultivars possess significantly higher levels of erucic acid (about 50%) and glucosinolates (100­280 u moles/g defatted seed meal).Plant breeders are currently facing the most daunting challenge: improving the long-term output of crop types. Groundwork and researches are in progress to strengthen the agronomic base of low yielding zero erucic lines, as well as to recombine low erucic acid and low glucosinolate to develop '00' varieties. This paper overviews the base work, on-going research, limitations and future prospects for yielding better oil and seed meal quality to increase the international market value and demand of various cultivars.