Pedigree selection for yield and quality improvement in tomato

The cost of hybrid tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) production, unavailability, and cost of hybrid seeds are constraints to tomato production in developing countries. To overcome this problem, it is important to develop inbred lines through appropriate conventional selection breeding. Three F1 monohybrids crossing followed by conventional selection of advanced segregating generations were done to identify superior recombinant sergeant inbred lines. The inbred lines showed approximately 75% yield improvement, 40% earliness in maturity, and 20% in total soluble solids (TSS) compared to their respective F1 hybrid vigor performances. This indicated the possibility of developing inbred lines with equivalent, or higher, inbred vigor and yield potential than their corresponding hybrid and respective F1 hybrids, thus, helping overcome the problem of hybrid seed unavailability, unaffordability, and cost of hybrid seed production.