▣ History of Peanut culture and research

Peanut is both an oilseed crop and a food grain legume. It has been grown for use as snack food, confection, etc. rather than vegetable oil in Korea. The history of peanut culture is not so long as that of major cereal crops such as rice, barley, soybean etc. in Korea. The exact time when peanut was introduced into Korea is however not clear so far. The peanut is thought to have been originated and domesticated in South America spreading throughout the world.
A historical literature on agriculture, Limwonkyeongjezi, which was written by a scholar Yu-Keo Seo in 1842~1845, gives a little description of peanut culture. This is the earliest record on the peanut up to date. Judging from this record it is generally accepted that the peanut was introduced into this country in 1845 or earlier. The peanut was probably brought to Korean peninsula from China. In the eighteenth century China introduced this crop from abroad. At that time Korea was closely connected with China for trade and culture interchange.
Scientific research and writing on the peanut started since the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1906, the Korean Empire founded the Agricultural Demonstration Station(ADS), and research and development of major crops including peanut were substantially activated by ADS. According to the report of the ADS(1910) runner type of peanut occupied 83% of total cultivated area and there existed some erect types of peanut among introduced varieties. Another report of ADS(1919) presented that erect type peanut produced larger seeds and higher yield than runner types and that harvesting labor was much saved in erect type. So the erect type was highly recommended to be cultivated for use as snack and confection. The Chosun(Korea) Agricultural Society reported that the cultivation area of peanut was only 183 hectares in 1914. Actual breeding program of peanut began at the Crop Experiment Station ins 1967. A lot of foreign varieties and local collections were compared on agronomic characteristics and promising lines were selected. Hybridization breeding program was launched at the Crop Experiment Station in 1969. As the results of continued breeding program and improvement of cultural practices in peanut, twelve varieties have been released for 20 years and cultivation area increased from 2,000 hectares in 1960s to 21,900 hectares in 1987. The progress of breeding and cultural practice improvement of peanut in Korea is presented in detail in the text.