Discuss the different steps involved in Conventional breeding method.

The basic steps involved in conventional breeding are:

• Screening : It is the method in which parents are selected. Plants having desired traits are screened from all the available variety of crops.
• Germplasm : Seeds of the screened plants are collected. Homozygous plants with the desired characters are grown by self pollination.
• Hybridization : Cross pollination between the pure line of plants having the desired characters is performed. It forms a hybrid plant.
• Selection : Hybrid plants which contain the desired character from both the parents are selected.
• Testing : Presence of desired character is tested by growing them in field and it is also ensured that they do not contain any undesirable mutation.
• Release : Finally the tested crop is released in the market.