September 2020 | Volume 33 | Issue 3 | Page 601 Pakistan Journal of Agricultural Research Research Article Introduction L ivestock is an important industry in Pakistan. Its rural economy is largely dependent upon livestock sector as 35 % income of 8 million families depends upon livestock. Being source of cash, food and fber it provides people with most of their needs. With 191.3 million animal heads livestock contributes 60.54% to agricultural value addition and 11.22% to GDP (GOP, 2018-19). To support livestock, nutrition of animals is of vital importance. In Pakistan main sources of nutrients for livestock are green fodder (51%), crop residues (38%), grazing (3%), cereal by- products (6%) and oil cake meals (2%) (Sarwar et al., 2002). Te estimated area under various fodder crops in the country is 2.03 million hectares with annual fodder Abstract | PARC oat is a newly approved lodging-resistant, late-maturing, and high-yielding fodder oats variety developed at Fodder and Forage Research Program, National Agricultural Research Centre (NARC) Islamabad, Pakistan. Tis variety was selected from material imported from New Zealand for better agronomic characters and improved fodder yield. For initial two years (2006-07 and 2007-08) selections were made, and head-to-row method was used to reduce hetrozygosity. In 2009-10 and 20010-11, this line was evaluated in preliminary yield trials, where it produced average 80.71 tha -1 green fodder yield while S-2000 produced 67.13 tha -1 (16.82% more green fodder yield than check). In terms of dry matter 20.100% increase in dry matter yield over check variety S-2000 was recorded (PARC Oat: 21.84 tha -1, S-2000 17.45 tha -1 ). In National Uniform Fodder Yield Trials (NUFYT) for frst year (during 2010-11) it produced average yield 46.71 tha -1 while check variety S-2000 produced 43.45 tha -1 (6.9% Increase) at seven diferent agro-ecological locations. During 2011-12 and 2013-14 average yield was 47.065 tha -1 but check (Sargodha, 2011) shows 42.76 tha -1 (9.1% increase). PARC-Oats exhibit a medium plant height (110-120 cm), high crude protein (36.23% over check variety S-2000), thick stem (14.86% more than check variety S-2000) and higher leaf area per plant (21.55% over check variety S-2000). Te variety is drought tolerant may be grown in semiarid and arid areas having minimum rainfall up to 300 mm, highly lodging-resistant, late-maturing i.e. stay green till mid May, having up to 12 % crude protein and having green fodder potential up to 100 tones ha -1 . PARC-Oat was approved by Variety Evaluation Committee (VEC) in March 2018. Muhammad Usama Hameed*, Zulfqar Ali Gurmani, Sajjad Khan and Allah Bakhsh Crops Sciences Institute, National Agricultural Research Center (NARC), Pakistan Agricultural Research Council Islamabad, Pakistan. Received | March 19, 2020; Accepted | June 23, 2020; Published | August 01, 2020 *Correspondence | Muhammad Usama Hameed, Crops Sciences Institute, National Agricultural Research Center (NARC), Pakistan Agricultural Research Council Islamabad, Pakistan; Email: uh_joiya@hotmail.com Citation | Hameed, M.U., Z. Ali G, S. Khan and A. Bakhsh. 2020. PARC oat: A new lodging-resistant, late-maturing and high-yielding variety of oats (Avena sativa L.) for Pakistan. Pakistan Journal of Agricultural Research, 33(3): 601-608. DOI | http://dx.doi.org/10.17582/journal.pjar/2020/33.3.601.608 Keywords | Fodder oat, Variety development, Pakistan PARC Oat: A new Lodging-resistant, Late-maturing and High- yielding Variety of Oats (Avena sativa L.) for Pakistan