A field research was conducted under field situation at the Research Area, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, to study the combining ability effects for yield and its components in sunflower. Fifteen accessions of sunflower were crossed in line x tester fashion. Crosses along with their parents were grown in the field. For this purpose 10 lines (G-16, G-68, G-146, G-55, G-82, G-40, G-9, HBR-5, A-18 and G-57) and 5 testers (G-3, G-32, G-61, G-50, and G-54) were crossed according to line x tester fashion. Among the lines G-82, G-40, G-9 and HBR-5 showed positive and significant GCA effects for No. of achene per head, 100 achene weight, and achene yield per plant and proved to be good general combiners for most of these characters. Among the testers G-3, G-61 and G-54 proved as good general combiners for most of the characters i.e. for number of days to flowering, plant height, internodal length, No. of achene per head and achene yield/ plant. The hybrids G-146 x G-54, G-16 x G-61, and G-82 x G-3 showed good specific combining effects are for all the characters. Genotypic differences were significant for all the characters."

Maize plant is a c4 plant having high input requirements including irrigation water. In Pakistan 25-30% of the total cropped area is rainfed where the available water resources are depleting very quickly. Water stress or drought is one of the major limiting fator in crop production around the globe. Water stress affects plant growth both at early stage and at grain filling stage resulting in decreased yield. Fifty inbred lines were used to study genetic variability, correlation and path co-efficient analysis among various seedling and maturity traits. Under drought conditions, 100-grain weight had positively and significantly correlated with root length, shoot length, fresh root weight and number of cobs. Days taken to silking had maximum positive direct effect on 100-garin weight. Number of ears had minimum positive direct effect on 100-grain weight.

The genetic solutions could fill up to 30% of the gap between potential and realized yields under water stress in Maize. Because of genetic complexity of drought tolerance, it is the most difficult trait to improve through conventional plant breeding. The challenge is even greater for developing drought tolerant plants for water-limited environments where the occurrence, timing, and severity of drought may fluctuate from year to year. The utilization of genetics for the improvement of drought tolerance and provision of yield stability is an important part of the solution to stabilize global maize production. Shortage of green fodder availability in quality and quantity, low productivity of livestock, competition of fodder crops with food and fiber crops for land and inputs, deficit of irrigation water, the dry matter production and other characters of maize, foster to work on maize fodder crop for genetic improvement in its yield, quality and drought tolerance. The aforesaid situation shows the need for increased research on the effects of drought.

It is imperative to enhance potential of existing livestock for milk and meat production to meet the demands of increasing population. The major constraint in achieving the goal is the unavailability of forage in terms of quantity and quality. Per unit area forage production should be increased. Therefore, evolution of best quality, high yielding, multicut fodder varieties/hybrids is of vital importance. It is desired to converge the favourable characters in interspecific hybrids and also to collect preliminary information for the development of better hybrids. Prospects are good for the recovery of plant types with improved forage yield and better nutritional quality due to the presence of heterosis in the hybrids for these traits. High genetic variability coupled with high heritability and genetic advance indicated that attempts to improve these traits would be successful. The hybrid combinations with high mean, with favourable SCA estimates and involving at least one of the parent with high GCA, would tend to increase the concentration of favourable alleles. Genetic base of parental lines must be broadened, to achieve better hybrids.