New spring barley variety ‘Rafael’ adapted to the conditions of the Central region

The purpose of the current study was to identify and present the most economically valuable features of the new spring barley variety ‘Rafael’ in the conditions of the Central region. There was developed a new spring barley variety ‘Rafael’ based on the Governmental task of the Federal State Budgetary Scientific Institution “Federal Research Center “Nemchinovka”, (FRC “Nemchinovka” (Moscow Region)) No. 0608-2019-0011 and the Institute of Seed Production and Agrotechnologies, a branch of the FSBSI “Federal Research Agro-engineering Center VIM” (ISPA, a branch of FSBSI FRAEC VIM (Ryazan region)) No. 0581-2019-0021. In 2020–2021 the variety was tested in the State Variety Testing. In 2022, the variety was included in the State List of Breeding Achievements of the Russian Federation and approved for use in the Central (3) and Volga-Vyatka (4) regions. The code of the variety is 8057530. There was received the patent No. 12254. Breeding number 35/1-09 h 662 was obtained when crossing the lodging-resistant variety ‘Ksanadu’ and the breeding lines 27/13-78 h 34 (‘Moskovsky 121 x Highproli’), identified from the genetic collection according to a complex resistance to helminthosporiasis of barley and soil drought. The analysis of long-term data (2014–2019) has shown that under various agrometeorological conditions of the environmental trials, the variety was characterized by improved productivity in comparison with the standard variety ‘Yaromir ‘and varieties of earlier breeding. In the experimental crop rotation FRC “Nemchinovka” exceeded the mean value of productivity on 0.44 t/ha, the productivity increase was on 0.68 t/ha more than that of the standard variety, and on 1.08 t/ha more than that of the parental variety ‘Ksanadu’. In the fields, the ISPA, a branch of FSBSI FRAEC VIM exceeded the standard variety on 0.09 t/ha, providing a mean productivity of 6.85 t/ha. The maximum value of the indicator of the variety stability level (PSSS = 141.6%) has characterized a high degree of variety adaptation to various environmental conditions. The economic efficiency calculation has shown an increased profitability of the new variety on 17.0–20.8% compared to the widespread varieties. The introduction of this variety into production can significantly improve and stabilize gross barley productivity in the Central and Volga-Vyatka regions of Russia, increase profitability of enterprises and provide the feed industry with domestic raw materials.