We are importing corn grains more than eight million tons every year, and self-sufficiency rate of corn is less than one percent. It is not easy to increase field corn production in Korea because of limited arable land. For this reason, many companies have been interesting overseas agriculture for corn production. But they don’t have enough suitable variety for the target area. Our objective is to develop field corn varieties for adaptation in Primorsky Krai which is the southeasternmost region of Russia. This project has been collaborated with Dr. Huk-Ha Lee in Seoul National Univ. and planted three times in Primorsky Krai since 2011. Planting materials for this project were developed in Maize Research Institute. 74 hybrids in 2011, 76 in 2012, and 80 in 2013 were planted for regional performance test. Primorsky Krai is a colder area and has less frost-free days than Korea. Several hybrids have shown good performance, but lots of materials developed in Korea could not fully ripened in 2011 because of late planting and early frost. In 2012, we mainly selected early flowering materials as well as picked materials from first year. The silking date of our materials was later than local commercial varieties, but some our hybrids had good characteristics and high yield. Among them, we picked two hybrids and planted them in Ussuriysk in Primorsky Krai for field demonstration test. We expect some of the selected hybrids can be candidate varieties for improvement of corn production at overseas agricultural production base.

In order to produce the organic foods in accord with international standard, organic seeds should be used in organic farming. This study was conducted to establish the stable production of organic seed of waxy corn by examining the growing characteristics, seed yield, and the economy for seed production by organic farming. The optimal sowing timing for organic seed production of waxy corn hybrid was within 10 days of the 1st of May with yield of 88~90% of conventional seed production. The optimal planting density was 41,600 plants/ha (80×30 cm) for organic seed production of waxy corn. The weight of 100 seeds and seed productivity increased at the planting ratio of 2:1 mother plant:male plant. Growth and seed production were improved by removing male plant at 7~10 days after silking. Organic fertilizer (mixed oil cake) was applied at a rate of 4~6 Mg/ha before sowing. Black plastic mulching was used for weed control. In addition, sex pheromone trap and bio-control agents were used for safe pest control and low labour cost.