Sexual Reproduction in Flowering Plants — BIOLOGY STD 12 Science — Question

Seeds, in general, are the product of fertilization but in some plants e.g. members of family Astraceae and grasses, seeds are produced without fertilization called apomixis. Thus, apomixis is a form of asexual reproduction. There are several ways of development of apomictic seeds. In some species, the diploid egg cell is formed without reduction division and develops into the embryo without fertilization. In citrus and mango varities some of nucellar cells start dividing, protrude into embryo sac and develop into embryos. In such species each ovule contains more than one embryos, referred as polyembryony.
Apomicts have several advantages particularly in hybrid seed industry. The hybrid varities are vigour, more productive and disease resistant but the production of hybrid seeds is very costly time consuming and do not maintain hybrid vigour in progeny due to segregation of characters/genes during the meiosis. If these hybrids are made into apomicts, there is no segregation of characters in the hybrid progeny and farmers can keep on using the hybrid seeds to raise new crops year after year and they do not have to buy hybrid seeds every year.