The Punjab Seed Council (PSC) approved 39 new verities of different crops for cultivation including 15 Bt cotton, 6 rice, 2 wheat, 1 sugarcane, 2 gram, 3 citrus, 4 peach, 3 flowers and 1 variety of each potato, tomato and turnip. A spokesman of the department said on Monday that 15 new BT varieties includes FH-118, FH-142, VH-259, BH-178, CIM-599, CIM-602, IR-NIAB-824, IUB-222, CEMB-33, SAIBAN-201, SITARA 11M, A-555, KZ-181, Tarzan-2 and CA-12 were provisionally approved for general cultivation keeping in view the issues of National Bio-safety Committee (NBC). Those rice verities were approved include: RSP-2, PK-386, HB-71, Y-26, Shahnshah-2 and Pride-1. The PSC also approved 2 wheat verities (Pakistan-2013 & Galaxy-2013), one sugarcane variety (CPF-248).—APP