URBANA, Ill. (U.S.A.) — When Chris Mujjabi found an envelope marked ‘Kitale Synthetic’ in a cold storage room at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the corn breeder knew he had stumbled on something special. He had gone looking for exotic germplasm that could improve yield or weed tolerance in his latest organic hybrids, but instead he found a connection to his past and his community.

“The name just resonated as African,” said Mujjabi, a doctoral student in the Department of Crop Sciences in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at Illinois. “I couldn’t wait to plant it — it felt like a piece of home.”

Mujjabi is from Uganda and, back home, corn is everything.

“Every single day, we eat it for breakfast, lunch, snacks, even in schools. It’s a staple.”

Across Africa — not just in Uganda — corn is eaten fresh, boiled, grilled, and ground into cornmeal. The names of the dishes vary from country to country, but corn’s prominence in the African diet is consistent across the continent. So is the preference for white corn.

It turns out that the Kitale research station in western Kenya was the 1960s-era birthplace of modern white corn hybrids in Kenya. Previously, most corn was open-pollinated, so it was harder to predict yield, disease tolerance, and other growth characteristics. When Kitale Synthetic was introduced, it quickly spread across East Africa. It also fit the preferred taste profile across African cultures: a little bit starchy and not too sweet.

When Mujjabi grew seeds from the ‘Kitale Synthetic’ envelope, some of the resulting ears were yellow and others were white. By performing cross after cross, he created three new white hybrids suited to the Central Illinois climate that he hoped would taste like corn from home. In early September, he invited members of the African community in Champaign-Urbana and Central Illinois for the inaugural “Kasooli Party,” a field day and taste test named for the Luganda word for white maize.

Among the 35 participants, Boris Alladassi, a postdoctoral research associate in crop sciences, was the first to taste the corn that day. “I picked the grilled corn right from the fire because I was so eager. It had been seven years since I last had grilled white corn in Africa, so it was a very pleasant experience. We really treasure having access to something we are familiar with from home.”

Mujjabi set up a sensory panel to rank his three white corn hybrids against American sweet corn as a control group. Among the African guests, sweet corn came in dead last.

“Many Africans think sweet corn is too sweet. We don't really like it. But that’s all we have access to here in the U.S.,” Mujjabi said.

Crop sciences professor Martin Bohn, who co-organized the field day and advises Mujjabi, says the demand for white corn extends to other expat communities that prefer a less-sweet cob. As proof of the demand, he points to work by “Mama Janet” Zintambila, a Kenyan farmer in Normal, Illinois, who produces and distributes white corn throughout the U.S.

“There is huge demand in places like Chicago, Indianapolis, Houston, and beyond,” Bohn said. “I’ve seen pictures where trailers come in filled with Mama Janet’s white corn, and people are already waiting in line. People come from all over.”

Kasooli Party attendees filled bags from the rows of white corn, but they’re looking for a more reliable supply. To meet future demand, Bohn and Mujjabi are developing organic seed for domestic growers.

Traits from ‘Kitale Synthetic’ are also proving useful in Bohn’s organic dent corn breeding program, conducted at the certified organic research fields managed by Illinois Organic, where the team evaluates hybrids under real-world organic production conditions.

Because it was developed in a tropical climate, Kitale Synthetic is taller and exhibits a more horizontal canopy architecture with broader leaves compared to the compact, upright stature of American varieties. Compact corn means more plants per row, but it also allows for more light to penetrate between rows. That means more weed growth.

“Upright stature doesn't work for us in organic. The more you open up the row, the more weeds,” Mujjabi said. “So we are thinking in a completely different way. We want more horizontal leaves so that the canopy closes earlier and more thoroughly to prevent weed growth.”

The research team hopes to breed corn with faster emergence and a more horizontal leaf architecture into their organic hybrids — traits that help the canopy close quickly and shade out weeds — along with other potentially beneficial genes that could increase yield, disease resistance, and more.

“That’s why we always want to introduce exotic germplasm in our organic breeding program. Rare alleles from Africa, in this case, may introduce traits that benefit our productivity,” Bohn said. “This really underscores the importance of maintaining high-quality corn germplasm collections and making them accessible to everyone. This germplasm was in my collection, but we need to protect public germplasm collections on our campus and globally.”

Research in the College of ACES is made possible in part by Hatch funding from USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. This study was also supported by NIFA’s Organic Research and Extension Initiative [grant numbers 2017-51300-27115 and 2020-51300-32180].