Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh Inaugurates Indigenous SPROUT Facility at BRIC-NIPGR to Accelerate Development of Climate-Resilient Crops

Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh inaugurated the indigenous SPROUT (SpeedSeed Phenotyping and Resource Optimization for Unified Trait Analysis) facility at BRIC-NIPGR, New Delhi. SPROUT is a season-independent, controlled-environment facility designed for high-throughput phenotyping, precision stress screening, and evaluation of climate-resilient crops, focusing heavily on chickpea. Combined with the SpeedSeed technology—which can reduce the chickpea generation cycle to approximately 40 days—the initiative connects genomics and gene technologies with faster trait evaluation. The facility operates under the broader BioE3 policy and the government's biotechnology push, aiming to accelerate agricultural resilience, food security, and the development of improved crop varieties tailored to diverse agro-climatic conditions.