IISR Surasa

IISR Surasa was released in late 2024 by ICAR and the Indian Institute of Spices Research through a farmer-participatory breeding programme, and it is genuinely novel: India's first ginger variety developed specifically for use as a vegetable rather than as a spice. The defining trait is that it is non-pungent, with organoleptic quality good enough to eat in quantity rather than use by the teaspoon. That opens ginger up as a cooked vegetable and salad crop instead of a seasoning, a category the crop has never had a purpose-bred cultivar for. Agronomically it is no compromise: under scientific management it yields up to 24.33 tonnes per hectare, with low fibre and a dry recovery of about 21%. For home growers it is the most interesting thing to happen to ginger breeding in decades, though seed availability outside India is currently nil.