Breeding new disease resistant loofah gourd hybrids

Two species of loofah, ridge gourd (Luffa acutangula) and sponge gourd (Luffa cylindrica), are important commercial food and cash crops rich in calcium, magnesium, potassium and vitamin A, that are grown mostly by smallholder farmers in Asia. However, production is affected by plant pests and diseases, and development of new varieties is hampered by seed companies having only a narrow genetic base to use in their breeding programs. In response to this, a new two-year project began in March 2024 that aims to develop and make available new hybrid varieties of these edible loofah gourds, that is funded by 27 private seed sector companies operating in Asia. The ‘Creating sustainable markets with solid loofah genetics’ project will build on many decades of WorldVeg experience on curcurbit breeding in Southeast Asia at the WorldVeg regional center in Thailand. It will focus specifically on identifying sources of resistance to two major diseases, tomato leaf curl New Delhi virus (ToLCNDV) and downy mildew (DM) developed through pedigree selection of heterozygous and heterogeneous landraces.

The aim is to make available genetically broad-based loofah lines and F1 hybrids possessing improved yield and resistance to ToLCNDV and DM, , alongside good horticultural traits such as the absence of bitterness, fruit color and length that are preferred in various market segments. In parallel, the genetic structure of WorldVeg loofah lines along with commercial checks will be made available to seed companies, to enable better decisions on the choice of parents for future hybridization. High yielding hybrids that could produce more than 30 tonnes per hectare will also be assessed in multi-environment trials in India and Pakistan.