ABSTRACT
Plant breeding for salinity resistance has been receiving much attention in this respect. Great optimism has been occasionally expressed in the past on the possibilities offered by breeding, even to the extent that viable farming could be maintained by growing resistant genotypes by irrigation with straight or diluted sea water. The involvement of plant hormones in mediating plant response to salinity is an attractive proposition. An effect in this respect has been ascribed to cytokinins and abscisic acid (ABA). The scale by which genetic variation for salinity resistance is measured bears great significance toward the probability of success in breeding. Additive genetic variance had an important effect. Dominance variance was more important in one cross than in the other. The saline field environment is inherently very variable. In the same field, salinity may vary from a negligible level to values as high as 50 dS/m which are too high even for halophytes.
