RiceToday Vol. 3, No. 4

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ISSN 1655-5422

www.irri.org

International Rice Research Institute October-December 2004, Vol. 3 No. 4

Officialpublication

InternationalYearofRice2

Rice year updatesScientific article awards

and Brazil full of beans

Summing upResearch with the giants

of rice, China and India

Quality time

Improving the nutritionand palatability of rice

Reason to cheerThousands of farmers kick the pesticide habit


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rought, floods and problem

oils trap many rice growers

in poverty, so making

iRice

Sciencefor a BetterWorld

Rice is

LifeI N T E R N A T I O N A L Y E A R O F R I C E 2 0 0 4


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contentsVol. 3, No. 4

International Rice Research InstituteDAPO Box 7777, Metro Manila, PhilippinesWeb (IRRI): www.irri.orgWeb (Library): http://ricelib.irri.cgiar.orgWeb (Riceweb): www.riceweb.orgWeb (Rice Knowledge Bank): www.knowledgebank.irri.org

Rice Todayeditorialtelephone (+63-2) 580-5600 or (+63-2) 844-3351 to 53, ext 2527;fax: (+63-2) 580-5699 or (+63-2) 845-0606; email: [email protected]

CoverAriel Javellana

publisher Duncan Macintosheditor Peter Fredenburgart director Juan Lazaro IV

designer and production supervisor George Reyesdeputy editor Adam Barclaycontributing editors Gene Hettel, Bill Hardyphoto researcherAileen Del Rosario-RondillaphotographerAriel Javellanacirculation Al Benaventeprinter Primex Printers, Inc.

Rice Todayis published by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), the worldsleading international rice research and training center. Based in the Philippines and withoffices in 11 other countries, IRRI is an autonomous, nonprofit institution focused onimproving the well-being of present and future generations of rice farmers and consumers,particularly those with low incomes, while preserving natural resources. IRRI is one of15 centers funded through the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research(CGIAR), an association of public and private donor agencies. For more information, visitthe CGIAR Web site (www.cgiar.org).

Responsibility for this publication rests with IRRI. Designations used in this publication

should not be construed as expressing IRRI policy or opinion on the legal status of anycountry, territory, city or area, or its authorities, or the delimitation of its frontiers orboundaries.

Rice Todaywelcomes comments and suggestions from readers. Potential contributorsare encouraged to query first, rather than submit unsolicited materials. Rice Todayassumes no responsibility for loss or damage to unsolicited submissions, which shouldbe accompanied by sufficient return postage.

Copyright International Rice Research Institute 2004

INTRODUCING IRRI ............................................................... 4Proud to lead the way

DONORS CORNER................................................................... 5Targeting human suffering: The Rockefeller Foun-

dation focuses on achieving lasting improvementsin the lives and livelihoods of poor people

NEWS............................................................................................ 6

Genetic resources treaty comes into forceASEAN agrees to formal relationship with IRRI

Bangladesh poverty elimination project winds up

Information technology to help rice farmers

RICE IN THE NEWS .................................................................. 9

Global warming has unexpectedly large effect onrice yield

Continuing food imports worry Chinese leaders

India renews focus on agriculture

Agriculture ministers adopt joint initiative in Beijing

Digesting nutrition in rice

Philippine government set to ramp up hybrids

REASON TO CHEER ...............................................................12Thousands of Bangladeshi rice farmers kick the

pesticide habit after proving to themselvesthat doing so saves money and safeguards theirhealth and the environment

SUMMING UP .........................................................................18In the calculus of rice and global food security,

China and India equal the rest of the worldcombined. The role of rice research in thesecountries is likewise great, as is the task ofcoordinating it for maximum benefit

JOINT ACCOUNT WITH INTEREST .................................22An international rice network celebrates 30 years

of impressive returns from the exchange ofgenetic assets

QUALITY TIME........................................................................26Rice scientists have long focused on helping

Asian farmers reap bountiful and reliable

harvests of affordable rice. Now they are takingup the additional challenge of improving thestaple grains nutrition and palatability

A HAPPENING LAB...............................................................30A state-of-the-art gene-discovery facility in the

Philippines has emerged as the buzzing hub ofan inclusive community of cereal scientists andtrainees

SPECIFIC BENEFITS ..............................................................32Farmers earn more from their rice crop by

scientifically optimizing fertilizer use

Special section: .....................................................................34INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF RICE

Arrozby another name: Celebrations in Latin America

Wedding rice not thrown but sown: IRRNBest ArticleAward winners announced

Rice year reports from across Asia and more

PEOPLE......................................................................................40Principal scientist retires after 29 years at rice institute

Keeping up with IRRI staff

Partners in progress

RICE FACTS ..............................................................................41Saving labor

Boosting labor productivity on rice farms raisesliving standards, even for landless workers

GRAIN OF TRUTH ..................................................................42Biopirates or pioneering conservationists?


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INTRODUCING IRRI

Proud to leadthe way

The world was a terrifyingplace in 1952-53. Theperiod saw the first use ofpopulation explosion in

Time magazine and a cruel irony thefirst detonation, over the Pacific Ocean, of

a hydrogen bomb. It also brought acrossthe Pacific two senior Rockefeller Founda-tion agriculturalists to study how to end

2 decades of stagnating rice yields in Asia.By 1960, the population explosion was acover story in Time, and the InternationalRice Research Institute (IRRI) was estab-lished in the Philippines to shore up globalfood security in the face of exponentialpopulation growth.

Along with the other midwife of theGreen Revolution, the Mexico-basedInternational Maize and Wheat Improve-ment Center, IRRI was a prototype for aglobal network of research centers that,since 1971, have found common purpose

within the Consultative Group on Interna-

tional Agricultural Research. With morethan US$400 million in annual fund-ing from its 63 cosponsors and memberstates and organizations in particularthe World Bank and developed countries

in North America, Europe andthe Asia-Pacific the 15-centergroup represents the worldslargest investment in mobiliz-ing science to generate publicgoods for poor farm com-munities.

Since IRRIs release in1966 of the first modernrice variety, the insti-

tute has led the way indeveloping improvedrice cultivars and other

agricultural technologiesto benefit Asias 200 million rice

farmers and the billions of rice consumers

who depend on them for reliable, afford-able supplies of their staple food. IRRIs

work, on its research campus at Los Baosand across Asia in collaboration with thenational partners it has nurtured, hasgreatly contributed to the near doubling of

the Asian rice harvest since 1970.Today, the institute combines rice-

biodiversity conservation, gene discovery

and plant breeding with natural resourcemanagement, integrated pest manage-ment, agricultural engineering andpostharvest technologies, and social andpolicy studies to develop ecologicallyand economically sustainable strategiesto reverse a troubling new stagnationin rice-yield improvement. This trendoccurs in the contexts of slowing popula-tion growth and Asian farmers enjoyingan average yield more than double that oftheir parents and grandparents at IRRIsfounding. It nevertheless threatens to

undermine the indispensable agricultural

foundation of development, thus sabotag-ing the prospects of todays 600 millionpoor in rice-producing Asia and a largeportion of the billions to be born in theseveral decades before the global popula-tion finally stabilizes.

People at IRRI take pride in howthey, their colleagues and their prede-cessors going back to the shell-shockedmiddle of the 20th century have helpedto make the world a more prosper-ous, safe and hopeful place. But muchremains to be done to achieve the UnitedNations Millennium Development Goalsand so alleviate hunger, want, prevent-

able disease, ignorance, inequality andenvironmental degradation. With contin-ued support, IRRIs 1,000 scientists, ad-ministrators, support staff and contract

workers will contribute much more thantheir share.


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DONORS CORNER

5Rice TodayOctober-December 2004

Targeting human sufferingand need by G a r y H . To e n n i e sse n

The Rockefeller Foundationfocuses on achieving lastingimprovements in the lives and

livelihoods of poor people by workingwith them to ensure that they areincluded among the beneficiariesof globalization. To this end, thefoundation provides grants in four

main areas: helping to eradicatepoverty and hunger, minimizingthe burden of disease, improvingemployment opportunities andincreasing the availability and qualityof housing and schools in the U.S.,and stimulating creativity and culturalexpression.

Since the foundations creationby American businessman andphilanthropist John D. Rockefellerin 1913, we have emphasized theimportance of generating newknowledge and harnessing existingknowledge to address the complex anddifficult challenges confronting poorpeople. By using the tools of science,technology, research and analysis, weare able to aim our efforts at the verysources of human suffering and need.

Our work to achieve food securityfor poor people starts with therealization that, of the more than 5billion people living in developingcountries, nearly 1.3 billion live on

less than US$1 a day. And, of thesepoorest of the worlds poor, themajority live in rural areas, mostly onsmall farms where climate and soilconditions are harsh and variable,and where years of hard labor oftenyield barely enough for survival. Forthese families, the productivity of thefarm and the success of any givenyears harvest are the sole factorsseparating household food securityfrom starvation.

The Rockefeller Foundation

seeks to help small farmers in

three ways: producing and dis-

tributing higher-yielding seeds;

conserving and enriching soil

for more productive, sustainable

farming; and developing markets

where small farmers can earn

more from surplus harvests

their surplus, store it safely, andtransport it in bulk to commercialcenters for a competitive price.

As the staple food of billions,rice has always been an importantfocus of our work. The foundationis proud to have been one of thefounders of the InternationalRice Research Institute (IRRI)in 1960. More recently, a nearly2-decade effort by the foundationspanning much of the 1980s and90s produced a community of rice

biotechnology researchers that hascreated more prolific, robust andnutritious strains of this staple crop.And much of our current fundingaims to improve rice, maize andother staples so that poor farmerscan grow food on land endowedwith less water, using less laborand fewer chemical inputs. IRRI,which continues to be an importantgrantee, has been a key partner inthese efforts and many others.

DR. TOENNIESSEN is the Rockefeller Foundation's

director for food security.

The Rockefeller Foundation seeksto help small farmers in three ways:producing and distributing higher-yielding and more resilient seeds;conserving and enriching soil for moreproductive, sustainable farming; anddeveloping markets where small farmerscan earn more from surplus harvests.

Breeding better varieties ofcrops, whether by traditional cross-hybridization or cutting-edgebiotechnology, has led to bigger andmore reliable harvests the essential

first step in combating poverty andstarvation. Soil conservation andenrichment programs increasinglyinvolve farmers and communityorganizations as well as scientists insetting priorities and in spreading newpractices to more and more farms. Someof our recent work in East Africa hasfocused on assembling the elementarycomponents of produce markets,including a new network of communitycereal banks where farmers aggregate


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NEWS

Briefly Briefly Briefly

6 Rice TodayOctober-December 2004

ARIELJAVELLANA

Rice tomorrowThis is the last of four special issues ofRiceToday for the International Year of Rice.The publishing schedule for 2005 is under

consideration.

Rice in ScotlandMike Jackson, IRRI director for programplanning and coordination, spoke on 2June in Edinburgh, Scotland, following an

invitation from the Cross Party Interna-tional Development Group of the ScottishParliament. His address, Achieving the UN

Millennium Development Goals beginswith rice research, was attended by mem-

bers of the Scottish Parliament as well asrepresentatives from Scottish business andacademic groups and nongovernmentalorganizations.

Iron-rich rice in ThailandResearchers from the Rice Research Insti-tute of Thailands Department of Agricul-

ture have discovered two strains of iron-richrice that could be developed to fight anemia

among the poor. More than a quarter ofthe countrys population is anemic. Theinstitute plans to continue its search foriron-rich strains, use genetic engineering tofurther boost iron content, and determinethe best growing and milling techniques topreserve iron in the rice.

French tiesSenior officials and scientists of FrancesAgricultural Research Center for Inter-national Development and Institut deRecherche pour le Dveloppement met

with IRRI representatives in Bangkok,Thailand, on 25-26 May to review andimprove current collaboration and identify

new opportunities. Participants called forfurther collaboration on several projectsincluding the Challenge Program on Waterand Food, the Consortium for UnfavorableRice Environments and initiatives for Af-

rica. The French institutes agreed to helptrain IRRI staff particularly talented

nationally recruited staff in France,while IRRI will help train young Frenchscientists. The next meeting was set for2006 in France.

China and Nepal onlineChina and Nepal are the latest countries to

join IRRIs Rice Knowledge Bank (www.

knowledgebank.irri.org), the online reposi-tory of rice know-how. The banks countrysites offer country-specific information andmaterials in local languages. Bangladeshhas also launched its own site, which will

be mirrored on IRRIs Rice KnowledgeBank server.

Hands-on in Vietnam and IndiaIRRI recently held its CD-based integratedpest management training courses forresearch and extension personnel in Viet-nam and India. Based on information in

The International Treaty on Plant GeneticResources for Food and Agriculturecame into force on 29 June following ratifi-cation by 55 countries.

The treaty establishes an internation-ally agreed framework that recognizes therights of the farmers and countries that

have developed ancestral crop varieties,and it implements an agreed mechanism forsharing the benefits arising from the exploi-tation of biodiversity, said N.R. SackvilleHamilton, head of IRRIs Genetic ResourcesCenter (see Grain of Truth on page 42).

The Food and Agriculture Organiza-tion (FAO) of the United Nations, whichdeveloped the treaty, is optimistic about itssuccess following qualified but widespreadinternational support across a wide range ofsectors, from the current U.S. administra-

tion to nongovernmental organizations. Around 600,000 samples held in

genebanks by the Consultative Group on In-ternational Agricultural Research (CGIAR)

will be put under the realm of the treaty,protecting germplasm that has alreadyaverted multiple food crises caused by dis-ease, pestilence and civil strife.

The treatys provisions include theMultilateral System for Access and BenefitSharing, which is designed to ensure easyaccess and exchange of plant genetic re-sources, and the fair and equitable sharingof benefits incurred. The system includes 35food crops and 29 forage crops of global im-portance and covers information exchange,

technology accessand transfer, and

capacity building.The treatys

Global Crop Di- versity Trust, setup by FAO and

the InternationalPlant Genetic Re-sources Instituteon behalf of theCGIAR centers,

will establish anendowment fundto support gene-

bank conservation and capacity buildingfor developing countries. ApproximatelyUS$45 million of the $260 million targethas already been pledged.

The treaty brings countries, farmersand plant breeders together and offers a

multilateral approach for accessing geneticresources and sharing their benefits, saidFAO Director General Jacques Diouf. Hu-mankind needs to safeguard and furtherdevelop the precious crop gene pool thatis essential for agriculture. The agreementrecognizes that farmers around the world,particularly those in the South, have devel-oped and conserved plant genetic resourcesover the millennia. It is now up to countriesto make the treaty fully operative.

See also Joint Account with Intereston pages 22-25. The urgent need for a workable treaty

on plant genetic resources can be seen inthe case of a gene known asXa21. Found inthe African wild rice species Oryza longis-taminata, Xa21 offers resistance to bacte-

rial blight. Research by public and privateorganizations including IRRI, Monsanto,

Pioneer and the University of California, Da-vis has been continuing since a sample ofO. longistaminata was brought from Mali toIRRI in the mid-1970s. Eight years ago, UCDavis set up a Genetic Resources Recogni-tion Fund to ensure that some of the benefitsand profits from the discovery flowed backto the plants traditional owners. But legal

wrangling and the dropping ofXa21 fromprivate companies research agendas havemeant that the people of Mali have yet to re-ceive any benefits at all. Read about it in the

Sacramento Bee (www.sacbee.com/static/live/news/projects/biotech/c1_1.html).

Genetic resources treaty comes into force


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IRRIs Rice Knowledge Bank, this type oftraining allows the institute to reach more

participants with fewer resources. Par-ticipants received hands-on experience incalculating yield losses caused by pest attackand discussed recent pest problems in theirrespective countries. They also talked withfarmers about their knowledge of pests andtheir existing management practices.

Filipino friendsPhilippines-based IRRI has coordinated with theKomisyon sa Wikang Filipino(Commission on the Filipino Language)to have five brochures translated intoFilipino.

Direct approachThe Bangladesh Rice Research Instituteheld a Review and planning workshop ondirect-seeded rice using the drum seederin Dhaka on 19-20 June. Participantsidentified and discussed future needs for

research and development, strengthenedpartnership among stakeholders, and

learned from farmers and researchers aboutthe successes, strengths and weaknesses ofdirect-seeding technology.

Wild project launchedAn initiative to boost the conservation anduse of the wild living relatives of some ofthe worlds key crops was launched on

28 June in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Bringingtogether the biologically rich countries of Armenia, Bolivia, Madagascar, Sri Lankaand Uzbekistan, In situ conservationof crop wild relatives through enhancedmanagement and field application aims toimprove key features of traditional crops,from their economic and nutritional value

to their ability to fight disease. Funded bythe Global Environment Facility, projectpartners include the International PlantGenetic Resources Institute and the UnitedNations Environment Program.

Blasting blastThe U.S. Department of Agricultures Agricultural Research Service (ARS) is exploringa promising new approach to control the

devastating rice blast fungus,Magnaporthegrisea, which causes rice yield losses of up to30% each year worldwide. ARS researchersare studying key genes from both the patho-gen and a resistant rice cultivar to determinehow resistant plants defend themselves

from a blast attack. As rice plants and their blast pathogens have evolved togetherplants that possess a resistance gene thatmatches a related counter-resistance genein the fungus will launch a strong defenseThe ARS aims to develop rice plants withsuch resistance genes.

Poverty on the mapIRRIs Social Sciences Division and the

Bangladesh Center for Policy Dialogueheld a discussion on rural poverty allevia-tion on 26 May in Dhaka. More than 100

The project Poverty Elimination ThroughRice Research Assistance (PETRRA) wound up after 5 years with a closingdialogue on Agricultural technology andinnovations for the poor in Dhaka on 13July. PETRRA was managed by IRRI incollaboration with the Bangladesh Rice

Research Institute (BRRI) and funded tothe tune of 9.5 million (US$17 million)

by the United Kingdoms Department forInternational Development.

The dialogue focused on sustaining theprojects innovations. Earlier, IRRI Repre-sentative and PETRRA Project ManagerNoel Magor spoke on PETRRA technolo-gies, extension, innovations and impactand IRRI Social Sciences Division HeadMahabub Hossain presentedPETRRA ap-

proach and policy overview.

In its 5 years, PETRRA has engaged over700 scientists and development profession-

als working with 47 localand international devel-

opment organizations toimplement 45 sustain-able rice-based povertyreduction subprojects,

which have helped over

11,000 farmers in morethan 500 villages acrossthe country. More than40% of the participants

were women.PETRRA broke new

ground for a large-scaledevelopment project bycalling on organizationsto make competitive bids for the control ofsubprojects, which ensured the most suit-able researchers for the job. The structure

also drew together three important strandsthat are normally considered separately

Bangladesh poverty project winds up

technology identification and develop-ment, identification of improved uptakemethods and pathways, and stimulationof policy dialogue for a pro-poor policyenvironment.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations agrees to formal relationship with rice institute

The Association of Southeast AsianNations (ASEAN) will establish formal re-lations with IRRI, bringing together the larg-est grouping of rice-producing nations andthe worlds leading rice research institute.

ASEAN senior officials for agricultureand forestry agreed to the new ties at a meet-ing in Kuching, Malaysia, on 11-13 August,following an approach from IRRI in 2003.

A letter from ASEAN Secretary GeneralOng Keng Yong informing IRRI DirectorGeneral Ronald P. Cantrell of the decision

arrived on 1 September, asRice Today wasgoing to press.

We look forward to collaborationwith ASEAN and its members and relatedorganizations such as ASEAN Plus Three,said Dr. Cantrell, referring to ASEANs link

with China, Japan and South Korea. Obvi-ously, IRRI already enjoys strong links witha number of ASEAN member nations, butthis new status for the institute will build onand strengthen these relationships.

Dr. Cantrell added that IRRI is espe-

cially interested in working with ASEAN inthree particular areas: water, global warm-ing and human resources. These problemsare shared by ASEAN members, so commonsolutions make a lot of sense, he said.

The decision follows a decade of waning support from the developed Westerncountries that are IRRIs traditional donorsThe institutes funding plunged from US$45million in 1993 to $26 million in 2003, asmany donors focused on other needs, suchas assistance for Africa.


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NEWS



people attended the event, which featureda presentation by Division Head MahabubHossain on IRRIs collaborative study withthree Bangladeshi institutions on mappingrural poverty to identify poverty hotspotsand the socioeconomic and biophysical fac-tors behind them (seePinning Down Rural

Poverty inRice Today Vol. 3, No. 3, pages30-31). Chief guest Mushfiqur Rahman,

chairman of the Parliamentary StandingCommittee of the Finance Ministry, said he

would take the findings of the study to thefinance minister and expressed the need for

better-managed anti-poverty programs.

Extending technologyThe Department of Agriculture of Sri Lankaand IRRI conducted a joint training work-shop on technology promotion and deliveryusing cyber extension on 28 June-2 July inPeradeniya, Sri Lanka. The training coursemarked the beginning of the collaborativeproject Improving productivity of theSri Lankan rice granary through effective

technology promotion and delivery systemsusing information and communicationtechnology. Participants learned how to

best use information technology to aidagricultural extension.

Dry discussionsAbout 140 scientists from Asia, Africa andLatin America met in Mexico on 24-28 May

to present their research on drought toler-ance in plants and discuss ways forward.

The meeting, supported by the RockefellerFoundation and the International Maize and

Wheat Improvement Center, looked mainlyat maize, rice and wheat, which account formore than half the calories consumed bypeople in the developing world.

Unfavorable advancesThe Consortium for Unfavorable RiceEnvironments (CURE) conducted its thirdannual steering committee meeting on2-4 June in Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand.The committee elected Thailands Suthep

Limthongkul as its next chairman andendorsed the appointment of IRRI SocialSciences Division Head Mahabub Hossainas the new CURE coordinator, replacingTom Mew, who has retired. Indonesia willhost the next steering committee meetingin June 2005. A seminar on Sustainablerice-based production systems in fragile riceenvironments and a workshop on Innova-

tive research methods and strategies wereheld concurrently with the meeting.

Rice reunionThe IRRI reunion on 25-27 June attractedabout 100 former IRRI staff and familymembers to Michigan State University. At-tendees included former IRRI plant pa-thologist Mike Bonman and retiring IRRIPrincipal Scientist Tom Mew, as well as twofounding staff members, Lloyd Johnson andCarolyn Moomaw Wilhelm. Rice breederHank Beachell, the 1996 World Food Prizelaureate who turned 98 years old in Septem-

ber, participated via speakerphone.

Information technologyto boost rice production

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) ap-proved in July a US$1 million grant tohelp improve food security and livelihoodsfor poor farmers in the Greater MekongSubregion using information and commu-nications technology (ICT) with help from

IRRIs Rice Knowledge Bank.The grant, from the Japan Fund for

Information and Communications Tech-nology, will help boost rice production inCambodia, Thailand and Vietnam by provid-ing better access to information on marketprices and improved production techniquesand global practices. Rice Knowledge Bankmaterial will be adapted to meet the needs oflocal farmers. The bank will also serve localagricultural extension workers, informationfacilitators, nongovernmental organizationsand other institutions.

ICT offers powerful new ways to cap-

ture, present and disseminate the wealth ofknowledge available, said C.R. Rajendran,director of the Agriculture, Environmentand Natural Resources Division of ADBs

Mekong Department. However, most poorand small-scale farmers are unable to accesssuch information available through ICT dueto language barriers, lack of tools and lack ofknowledge about existing information. Also,they may be overwhelmed and intimidated

by ICT. Agricultural extension workers and

organizations that work with and supportpoor farmers often have limited knowledge

PYONGYANG POWWOW: Posing in front of the Plant Protection Research Institute (PPRI) of the Academyof Agricultural Sciences in the capital of the Democratic Peoples Republic of (North) Korea are (from left)an unidentified PPRI scientist; Zhao Kaijun, IRRI liaison scientist for China; an unidentified scientist; Jojo

Lapitan, senior manager in IRRIs International Programs Management Office; Ren Wang, IRRI deputy direc-tor general for research; Ri Je-Ok, PPRI deputy director; an unidentified scientist; K.K. Jena, senior scien-tist in IRRIs Plant Breeding, Genetics and Biochemistry Division and IRRI representative to the Republicof (South) Korea; and Jon Dong-Gon, officer in the Department of International Science and TechnicalExchange of the North Korean Academy of Agricultural Sciences (AAS). The AAS invited IRRI scientists tohelp assess the countrys rice research-and-development needs and explore opportunities for cooperationat a 20-24 July meeting, where they identified as priority areas hybrid rice research and breeding for high-yielding varieties with low water and nitrogen inputs. A follow-up meeting was agreed for 2005.

of global practices and little experiencein applying ICT-based information at thelocal level. These countries need to buildand strengthen agricultural informationnetworks to manage and apply informationto benefit farmers, said Rajendran.

The grant complements the JapanFund for Poverty Reduction grant for Im-proving Poor Farmers Livelihoods throughPostharvest Technology approved earlierthis year (see Rice Today Vol. 3, No. 3,page 8).

PPRI


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RICE IN THE NEWS


E verybody has been talking about the weather lately. ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN,

VOA, AP and Reuters were among the broadcasters and global news organiza-tions covering it at length. The Miami

Herald, Washington Post,Philippine Daily

Inquirer, Philippine Star and HindustanTimes were among the newspapers thatcarried the item.

The reason? New research demon-strates that, as AP put it, Global warmingcould mean bad news for one of the worldsmost important crops, rice.

Field studies conducted at IRRI con-firmed predictions from theoretical studiesthat global warming will make rice cropsless productive. Combining a quarter cen-tury of climate data collected at IRRI with

yield trends in adjacent fields over the pastdozen years, researchers further discovered

that simulation models underestimated theproblem by half because they overlookedthe pernicious effect of higher minimumnighttime temperatures.

The study, reported in the 6 July issue

ofPNAS, the proceedings of the NationalAcademy of Sciences of the United Statesof America, found that rice yields at IRRIdeclined by 15% for every 1C increase inmean daily temperature. Temperatures areprojected to rise globally by 1.5-4.5C in thecoming century or 3 to 9 times more thanin the past century. Global warming thus

Chinas surging food imports havereceived broad coverage both in China

and globally. In the 23 August FinancialTimes newspaper, James Kynge reportedthat Chinas becoming a net importer offarm produce [is] raising concerns at thehighest levels of government about the secu-rity of the food supply for 1.3 billion peopleas land and water shortages put pressure ondomestic grain production.

Chinas imports of farm produce in the

first half of 2004 rose 62.5% over the sameperiod of 2003. The biggest changes wereseen in grain imports as strategic stocks fell

because of declining annual harvests everyyear since 1998, Kynge wrote, adding that

Chen Xiwen, a senior state council official,said recently that Chinas grain produc-tion-consumption deficit this year would

be about 37.5 million tons.The leadership is very concerned

about food security, reportedly said anacademic who advised the government onfood security issues. They were all young

Chinas grain deficit. A report on the frontpage noted that the rice harvest will likelyrecover this year thanks to a 533,000 haexpansion of planted area over 2003.

We can meet the target of producing455 million tons of grain this year, but wehave no reason to feel relaxed because adeficit remains, Chen reportedly said athe 17 July opening ceremony of the China

Food Security Research Center, a nationafood security think tank in Beijing.

At the beginning of this year, thegovernment decided to spend a record 150

billion yuan (US$18 billion) to encouragefarmers to increase grain production, toimprove rural infrastructure and to ensurethe countrys food security this year, thereport added.

A longer feature on page 5 (wwwchinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-07/19/content_349485.htm) reviewedthe history of grain production in Chinalooked forward for the next 3 decades, and

by 10% for every 1C increase in seasonamean minimum temperature. Because theincrease in night temperature was 3 times

greater than the increase in daytime tem-perature, rice yields declined by 15% for ev-ery 1C increase in daily mean temperature double the predicted 7% decline.

LOVE IN A TIME OF PESTICIDES for Asian rice

farmers was the headline of the 15 July issueofNature report on radio soap operas beingdeveloped in Vietnam and Laos by IRRI and localpartners. The shows, it said, merge tips on thefrugal use of pesticides with drama based oneveryday tales of farming folk not unlike The

Archers, a U.K. program with a similar agricul-tural mandate. Our research shows that 80% of

pesticides are spread at the wrong time for thewrong insect, Nature quoted K.L. Heong, theIRRI entomologist who initiated the project, assaying. A US$300,000 grant from the RockefellerFoundation (see page 5) will support the devel-opment of two programs per week for a year.

Global warming has unexpectedly large effect on rice yield

threatens to erase the hard-won produc-tivity gains that have kept the rice harvestgrowing in step with population.

The study recorded that the meanminimum nighttime temperature duringthe dry season at IRRI has risen since 1979

by 1.13C, or 3 times the 0.35C rise inmean maximum daytime temperature. Thisdifference is an expected consequence of

increased greenhouse gas concentrations inthe atmosphere, and IRRIs climate recordsare consistent with warming trends foundelsewhere in the Philippines and globally.

The news is that high nighttime mini-mum temperatures clearly and stronglysuppressed rice yields in the seasons in

which they occurred, while high daytimetemperatures had no measurable effect.

Most studies of temperature andglobal warming effects on crop growth and

grain yield are based on daily mean air tem-perature, which assumes no difference in theinfluence of day versus night temperature,

wrote the nine-member research team fromIRRI, China and the United States led by

IRRI crop physiologist Shaobing Peng. Thisreport provides direct evidence of decreasedrice yields from increased night temperatureassociated with global warming.

Theoretical models had predicted a 7%decline in rice yields for every 1C increasein daily mean air temperature. However,

yields in the experimental fields actually fell

Continuing food imports worry Chinese leaders who lived through famine in the 1960s

men during the famine of the late 1950sand 1960s. It is not only a strategic issue ofdependence on foreign markets for them,it is also a very personal issue of food self-sufficiency.

AFP, the French news agency, reportedon 19 July, citing Chen, that Chinas pro-duction of wheat, corn, rice and other foodgrains dipped from a record high of 512

million tons in 1998 to some 435 million[by another account 431 million] tons in

2003. Last years deficit of 55 million tonsprompted, the report said, a dramaticrise in imports resulting in across-the-

board grain price rises on internationalmarkets.

The report added, Chinese PremierWen Jiabao this month said that developingagriculture was a major priority for the gov-ernment and reiterated plans to strengthenChinas grain-production capacity by urginglocal governments to subsidize producers.

On the same day as the AFP report, theChina Daily ran two prominent stories on continued on page 10


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RICE IN THE NEWS


considered how the country, quoting anold Chinese saying, can repair the house

before it rains.An earlier report, released on 8 June by

Bloomberg News, pointed out that Chinaswoes are a boon to Thailand, which morethan tripled its rice exports to China in thefirst 4 months of 2004, raising rice exportearnings by 41% to $680 million.

Citing IRRI economist David Dawe,the report said that China has importedmore rice than it exported only 3 times inthe past 44 years: Chinas future need forrice is the million-dollar question, Dawe

said. It affects everybody whos importingand exporting rice around the world. []The effects of even small price fluctuationson the welfare of producers and consumers,especially on the poor, can have politicalrepercussions.

Dr. Dawe reportedly added that Chinascurrent grain shortfall mirrors an earlier

a comprehensive agricultural park in Laosfor Chinese enterprises to produce grain.The $4.98 million, 5,000 ha agriculturalpark will include farmland, fisheries andfarm-produce processing.

The project is not the first of its kind inChina, the report said. In 1996, a companyin northwest Chinas Xinjiang AutonomousRegion invested $50,000 to develop 150 ha

in Cuba for growing rice, where a yield of 4.8

t/ha set a record for the Caribbean island.In 1998, the Xinjiang firm bought 1,050 haof rice land from the government of Mexicofor $3.2 million and achieved, after fourharvests, a yield of 5 t/ha, or 1.5 t/ha abovethe Mexican average.

The day after the Xinhua report, theprivate intelligence firm Stratfor (www.stratfor.com) reported, The announcementof the Laotian deal follows a similar plan for3,000 Chinese laborers to move to Kazakh-stan to work 700 square kilometers to growsoybeans and wheat and breed animals.

The Chinese news service Xinhua (www.chinaview.cn) reported on 23 May that

a 2-day Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD)workshop in Beijing had attracted agricul-ture ministers or vice ministers from 20countries. Participants agreed to cooperatein the areas of development policy, practicaltechnology, sustainable development, andrural development and poverty alleviation.

Chinese Vice Minister of AgricultureZhang Baowen reportedly promised thatChina will organize two follow-up activities:an ACD agricultural policy forum to discussdevelopment strategy and policy measuresand, to mark International Year of Rice, a

rice-development workshop and technologyexhibition.

Xinhua also covered, on 17 May, areport from the Food and Agriculture Orga-nization (FAO) of the United Nations declar-ing that rice plays and will continue to play

The Food and Agriculture Organization(FAO) of the United Nations released

in June a paper entitled Nutritional con-tribution of rice and impact of biotechnol-ogy and biodiversity in rice-consumingcountries.

Rice is the predominant staple food inat least 33 developing countries, providing27% of dietary energy supply, 20% of dietaryprotein and 3% of dietary fat, begins thepaper, adding that, in such rice-dependentcountries as Bangladesh, Laos, Vietnam,Myanmar and Cambodia, rice suppliesmore than half of the dietary energy andprotein and 17-27% of dietary fat. Rice can

contribute nutritionally significant amountsof thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and zincto the diet, but smaller amounts of othermicronutrients.

Looking into research to raise thecontent of iron in rice is a report in the May-June issue ofADB Review, published by the

Asian Development Bank. Iron deficiency isthe most common of all nutritional deficien-cies, writes health specialist Lisa Studdert,

who then describes ADB-supported re-search, notably a feeding trial of more than300 religious sisters in the Philippines. Thetrial concluded in September 2003 and, sofar, the analysis of data indicates that theresults have been positive.

The complete FAO report is availablein HTML format at www.fao.org/DO-CREP/006/Y4751E/y4751e05.htm#bm05.

TheADB Review article is available at www.adb.org/Documents/Periodicals/ADB_Re-view/2004/vol36_3/rice_power.asp.

one in 1995-96, as rapid economic growthis leading to more jobs outside agricultureand, thus, labor shortages in agriculture.He further predicted that China will man-age this in a way that doesnt disrupt pricestoo much.

One approach the Chinese are taking,according to an article published in June by

Nature, is to increase government funding

for research and field trials of rice geneti-

cally modified for stress resistance. Fundingof GM rice programs stands at $120 million,or 10% of Chinas total biotech budget ($1.2

billion for 2001-05, a 4-fold increase over1996-2000), said the report, adding thatthe budget for field trials at the China Na-tional Rice Research Institute in Hangzhouenjoyed a 50% boost this year.

Another approach is to acquire farm-land abroad. The Chinese news agency Xin-hua announced on 24 May that the Chong-qing Municipal government had inked a dealin March with Laos to cooperatively build

Agriculture ministers adopt joint initiative in BeijingDigesting nutrition in rice

a crucial role in the sustainable agriculturaldevelopment of the Asia-Pacific region. Therelease of the report coincided with FAOsannual Regional Conference for Asia and thePacific, held in Beijing on 17-21 May.

The report was not optimistic, however,about the future of the international ricetrade, which it projected to increase at amodest 1.5 % per year in the current decadeto 29.3 million tons in 2010, much below theexplosive growth of the 1990s.

Xinhua said the report called for radicalchanges in rice-trade policy. For an in-depth look at the questionWhere will demographics take the Asia-

Pacific food system? in Amber Waves, which is published monthly by the Eco-nomic Research Service of the U.S. Depart-ment of Agriculture, log on to www.ers.usda.gov/amberwaves/june04/features/

WhereWillDemographics.htm.

China ... continued from page 9

TheManila Bulletin reported on 13 Junethat the Philippine government is deter-

mined to plant more hybrid rice within thenext 6 years to improve food security andlivelihoods for its growing population.

Our ability to produce more rice trans-lates to more livelihood opportunities and,

ultimately, to an adequately fed population key elements in the eradication of povertyand the attainment of economic develop-

ment and lasting peace, reportedly said LuisLorenzo, Jr., then agriculture secretary.He was speaking at a seminar on Rice

Philippine government set to ramp up hybrids

and the Filipinos: The Last 100 Years, heldat the Bureau of Plant Industry in the Que-zon City capital district of Metro Manila.The seminar was the first in a series of eightseminars jointly organized for International

Year of Rice by the Philippine Rice ResearchInstitute, Philippine Institute for Develop-

ment Studies, and several other researchand educational institutions.

The paper reported that the 130,000

ha already planted to hybrid rice in thePhilippines could expand to 1 million hain 2005.


11/33


The prolific and opinionated Financial Express specialcorrespondent Ashok B. Sharma, who in Augustreceived the first-ever Prem Bhatia Memorial Award forreporting on environmental and social affairs, wrote inJune about some healthy developments in the globalagricultural research system, in particular a good flowof funds from the member countries to the ConsultativeGroup on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).At the end of the article (www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=60811) he concluded, It

is high time that India, which is a beneficiary of theCGIAR system, adequately increase its contribution. Karen von Hahn asked, in the 5 June edition ofthe Globe and Mail, Is rice the new fine wine?She added that the humble grain appears poisedto take center stage as the next peasant food to getthe gourmet treatment in the newspapers homemarket of Toronto, Manhattan and beyond. Even adecade ago, peoples rice palates werent particularlysophisticated, reportedly said Caryl Levine, founderof Lotus Foods, a California-based rice importer.Now, rice is the next pasta. Its becoming the centerof the plate. Feast on it at www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040605/NOTICED05/TPEntertainment/Style.

This was the headline the International

Herald Tribune gave in its 12 Julyedition to a Bloomberg News story by Sub-ramaniam Sharma. Sharma reported thatNew Delhis plans to increase spendingon irrigation facilities in rural areas andincrease loans to farmers will spur growthand bolster demand for manufacturedproducts, according to company executivesand investors.

In his budget speech on 8 July, FinanceMinister P. Chidambaram earmarked 28

billion rupees, or US$611 million, for irriga-tion projects and 26.1 billion rupees for rural

water-supply plans in the year ending on 31

March 2005. Another 22.47 billion rupees hasbeen set aside for rural housing, and Chidam-baram repeated the governments intention todouble agricultural credit in 3 years.

About 58% of Indias more than 1billion people depend on agriculture for aliving, said the report. With agricultureaccounting for a fourth of the economy,improving irrigation in a country that relieslargely on rain for watering crops will helpraise yields and farm incomes with knock-on benefits for the rest of the economy.

However, Ashok B. Sharma, writing inthe 12 July Financial Express (www.finan-cialexpress.com), complained about gaps inthe proposals, particularly regarding farm

credit and agricultural research. Sadly, thereis no increase in the allocation for agricultureresearch and education, he wrote.

Sharma reported that the IndianCouncil of Agricultural Research has longdemanded that the 5-year plan allocation to

Network (www.sunnetwork.org). Thereare also severe malnutrition cases amongfarmers in some areas of Maharashtra and

Orissa. It was decided to study in depththe role of technology and public policy inmitigating such suffering.

Dr. Swaminathan was speaking at a2-day seminar on Medicinal and AromaticRice of Kerala organized by the Kerala

Agricultural Research Station, Pattambiin connection with the celebrations of In-ternational Year of Rice.

In another context, the Wall StreeJournalquoted Dr. Swaminathan in its 25June edition under the headlineAn Indian

Paradox: Bumper Harvests and RisingHunger. Increasing food production isgreat, but we have to think about the wholechain, he reportedly said, explaining his

foundations advice to a struggling farmer

that he should drive a taxi to help overcomethe famine of jobs and livelihoods thatafflicts India today.

It is virtually impossible to simplyhand out food surpluses to the hungrydespite the fact that undernourishmentcauses thousands of deaths a day, becauseof the cost and complexity of distribution,

wrote journalists Roger Thurow and JaySolomon. It would also turn recipients intopermanent wards of the world. I believe inGandhis strategy: Dont turn people into

beggars, says Dr. Swaminathan.

MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Keepers of the Secrets of

Rice was the headline for Linda Bolidos profile ofFlora de Guzman (left), manager of the Interna-tional Rice Genebank at IRRI, and Thelma Paris,gender specialist in the institutes Social SciencesDivision. The article appeared in the 29 Augustedition of the Philippine Inquirer(http://news.

inq7.net/sunday/index.php?index=1&story_id=7567). For the longest time, the only waywomen were ever associated with rice was whenthey were cooking and serving it, lamentedBolido, adding that these two women scientistsare fast revising that image through their work onrice research.

ALSO Rice was the cover story of the 16-22 July edition(Vol. 24, No. 2) ofnepalnews.com (www.nepalnews.com.np/contents/englishweekly/spotlight/2004/jul/ jul16/coverstory.htm). Keshab Poudel explains howweather, negligence and market conditions threatenthe Himalayan kingdoms rice biodiversity. Poudel alsointerviews the Nepali agricultural scientist DhrubaNarayan Manandhar, and headlines the sidebar withthe quote, Nepal can claim to be a country of origin ofrice. Finally, Sanjaya Dhakal details recent challengesboth drought and heavy rains have brought farmers. Several stories by Mike Lee in the Sacramento Beein July and August traced the brewing of a November

ballot-box brawl over agriculture in California. Fourconsumer and environmental groups sought to banbiotech crops. A particular target was rice developed bySacramento-based Ventria Bioscience that produces twocommon human proteins expected to be used to treatsevere dehydration. Rice industry leaders reportedlyfeared that the initiative, if passed in Butte County,would impede advances at the agricultural research sta-tion at Biggs, which develops 90% of Californias rice. Asia-Pacific Perspectives: Japan Plus, published inTokyo by Jiji Gaho Sha with support from the CabinetOffice of the Japanese government (www.jijigaho.or.jp/index01.html), ran in its June 2004 edition (Vol.2, No. 2) a 5-page profile ofKeijiro Otsuka, chair ofthe IRRI Board of Trustees.

India renews focus on agriculture

agricultural research be at least 1% of agri-culture GDP, or 113 billion rupees. Meetingthat goal in the current 5-year plan wouldrequire an additional allocation of 88.2 bil-lion rupees in the remaining 2 years.

Sharma had earlier, on 2 June, mootedthe appointment of M.S. Swaminathan, 1987

World Food Prize laureate (see World FoodReprise inRice Today, Vol. 3, No. 3, pages12-17) and former director general of IRRI(1982-88), as chairman of the newly consti-tuted National Commission on Farmers. Hequoted Krishan Bir Choudhary, chairmanof the Indian farmers organization BharatKrishak Samaj, as saying that the panel is

intended for the farmers. The chairman ofthis body should be a farmer and not a bu-reaucrat or a technocrat or a scientist.

Dr. Swaminathan was just then deliv-ering to the agriculture minister the reportof a biotechnology task force he headed,

which recommended setting up a regula-tory authority to generate public confidence.Reuters quoted the report as saying: The

bottom line of our national agricultural bio-technology policy should be the economic

well-being of farm families, food and healthsecurity of the nation, health security of theconsumer, protection of the environment,and security of our national and internationaltrade in farm commodities.

As chairman of the commission, Dr.Swaminathan has initiated study of a recentrash of farmer suicides. There are incidents

of farmers suicides in parts of AndhraPradesh, Karnataka and Kerala, he wasquoted as saying in late August by the Sun


12/33

Rice TodayOctober-December 2004 Rice TodayOctober-December 2004

Thousands of Bangladeshi

rice farmers kick the pesticide

habit after proving to

themselves that doing so saves

money and safeguards their

health and the environment

Reason to cheerby Adam Barclay, photography by Aileen del Rosario-Rondilla

An American leads 3,000Bangladeshi farmers in arising Thai victory chant:Chai yo! Chai YO! CHAI

YO! The scene is rousing,if odd, and the cheer is appropriate

because these farmers in the districtof Comilla, 80 km southeast ofthe capital, Dhaka, have won an

extraordinary victory.They are the vanguard of what

could become one of the mostbeneficial rural movements in

modern Bangladeshi history. If theLivelihood Improvement ThroughEcology (LITE) project, led by theInternational Rice Research Institute

(IRRI), continues as it has started,in less than a decade, most ofBangladeshs 11.8 million rice farmers almost a 12th of the countryspopulation of 141 million, according

to the Bangladesh Rice ResearchInstitute (BRRI) will have stoppedusing insecticides and optimizedtheir fertilizer use, thereby increasing

their income by an average oper year. That may not soundmuch to some, but where theannual farm income after exp

is around $100, this money hchildren through school or buto tide rice-deficit farm familto the next harvest.

LITE part of the IRRI-

project Poverty Elimination TRice Research Assistance, funBangladesh by the United KiDepartment for Internationa

A GROUP OF RICE FARMERS, led byvelopment expert Jan Orsini (hiddan incongruous but rousing Thai vchant in Comilla, Bangladesh. Orsenthuses from the podium of the days workshop for 3,000 farmersthe success of the Livelihood Imp

Through Ecology (LITE) project.


13/33


evelopment set out to discovere exact cause of an expected drop in

ce yield when farmers stop sprayingsecticide. The original aim, explainsTE principal investigator and IRRInior entomologist Gary C. Jahn,as to identify safe alternatives to

secticides.To my surprise, reports Dr.

hn, when people stopped spraying,

elds didnt drop and this wasross 600 fields in two different

stricts over four seasons. Imnvinced that the vast majority ofsecticides that rice farmers use arecomplete waste of time and money.

successful than their neighbors, aretrained to use the LCC and performthe experiments that prove they dontneed insecticides. They then train

other farmers in their own village,as well as successful farmers fromsurrounding villages, who becomethe next lead farmers. The new leadfarmers do the same, and the process

repeats. The number of trainedfarmers grows exponentially eachrice season like recipients of achain letter, but this time good things

actually happen.

Success stories

The strategy can help improve theway people manage an enormous

range of enterprises, not just farming.Jan Orsini, an IRRI consultant toLITE and a former United Nations

rural development officer, is theSCR expert who led the Thai victory

chant (he lives with his Thai wife inBangkok). Orsini brims with passion

when he discusses SCRs ability toimprove peoples lives, describing

If they dont spray they lose nothing,but they gain a lot money, a saferenvironment and reduced risk to theirhealth.

LITE farmers also learn to reduceand optimize their application ofnitrogen fertilizer (urea). They do this

by comparing the four panels of theleaf color chart (LCC) to the leaves

of their rice crop, and then fertilizingthe crop just enough for the leavesto match the ideal color (see Chart

Hit for N Sync on page 33). The

practice allows farmers to spend lesson fertilizer and so improves theirefficiency and profitability. Whatsmore, in the 2004 dry season, farmersfollowing the LITE strategy increased

their yields by an average of 400 kgper hectare a significant boost forstruggling farm families.

The method used to expand thescale of LITE from a few hundred

farmers to several thousand andpotentially millions is known assuccess case replication (SCR). Leadfarmers, identified as being more

success stories ranging from farmercooperatives in the Philippines toguitar manufacturing in Vietnam.

A major advantage of SCR is

its cost effectiveness, eliminatingthe need for large numbers of paidstaff or expensive equipment andinfrastructure. You dont need atraining center, explains Orsini. All

the training is hands-on. Theres notheoretical training at all. It doesntmatter if the successful person cantread or write. All he has to do is

explain and show others how to do it.With an average of more than

1,000 people per square kilometer compared with 30 in the UnitedStates and 250 in the Philippines

Bangladesh is more crowded thanAustralia would be with every livinghuman squeezed into it. Historically,

Bangladesh was relatively prosperous,but political instability, war and

overpopulation have reduced it inmodern times to one of the worldspoorest countries.

Rice farming is a tough life,

and subsistence is as good as manyBangladeshis can hope for. So whenthe government began doling outfree insecticides to rice farmersin 1956, spraying rapidly gained a

firm foothold. Subsidies continued 100% until 1974, then 50% and the government conductedcampaigns encouraging farmers tospray. Indiscriminant insecticide use

became so entrenched that the endof government handouts in 1978 sawfarmers simply shoulder the wholecost.

Natural enemies

Why doesnt spraying help yield?First, many supposed insect pestsdont attack the parts of the plant

that affect grain production, or thegrain itself, under farm conditions and so arent pests at all. Second,many farmers use poor equipment

to apply out-of-date or inappropriateinsecticides at the wrong time.

And third, insecticides can kill thenatural enemies of rice pests moreeffectively than the pests themselves,

compromising natural pest control.Nazira Qureshi Kamal, the head ofBRRIs Entomology Division and

LITEs in-country coordinator, pointsout that the mere presence of insects

on the crop can panic farmers intospraying.

But it is not enough for a scientistto tell farmers, hey, dont bother withinsecticides. An outsider, with all the

best intentions in the world, wont bebelieved. And so it was that thousandsof Bangladeshi farmers became

agricultural scientists themseThe two nongovernment

organizations working with L AID-Comilla in Comilla ankm northwest of Dhaka in RaDebi Chowdhurani Poribar UKendra (DCPUK) taught le

farmers how to conduct a simexperiment by partitioning thinto quadrants receiving diffe

E PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR Gary C. Jahn ( below) at a workshop for 1,500 farmers in Rangpur. LITE farmer Kamrul Hasan and his wife Jannatol Ferdous (top) use theirings to buy better food and clothes for their children. Thousands of women (opposite bottom) most of them wives of LITE farmers attend the farmer workshopComilla. While few women in Bangladesh tend rice fields, they often play an integral role in decision-making and help with crop management. Many farmers supple-nt their income by pedaling a rickshaw (opposite top), seen here passing a rice field in Comilla.


14/33


anagement strategies, with andthout spraying and the LCC (see

ure above). Other participatingrmers bisected their fields, sprayinge half but not the other.

Each lead farmer helpedur other farmers carry out the

periment and record theirsecticide and fertilizer costs forch treatment in specially designedtebooks. Recording the dataemselves lent farmers a sense of

wnership over the project, andeir supervisory duties earned leadrmers self-confidence and thespect of the other farmers, who,

ing social equals, were neithertimidated nor distrustful. To ensuree accuracy of the data, Dr. Jahn andrsini paid unannounced visits tondomly selected farmers to verify

eir measurements.Augmenting the farmers data,

RRI technicians collected insectsom the LITE fields to determine

w neighboring crops andsecticide and urea applicationsfect the diversity of rice pests andeir natural enemies. Insecticidesused the greatest loss of overall

odiversity, perversely reducing theversity of natural enemies morean that of pests.

AID-Comilla founder Abul

Kalam Azad stresses that the keyto LITEs success is its simplicity.A previous pest-managementproject I worked on was technicallycomplicated, he explains. It took 6

months to train the farmers, and theycouldnt remember everything. As

well as being poor, many farmers inBangladesh are illiterate. They cant

easily adopt complicated technologies.With LITE, the technology and themessage are very simple LCC, noinsecticide.

Wildest dreamsWe quickly realized, says Dr. Jahn,the most important thing to focus on

was scaling LITE up. Weve already

trained 2,000 farmers. Weve reducedinsecticide use among participatingfarmers by 99%, and by 90% amongnonparticipating farmers in the same

villages. Even in the control villages,

where no farmers conducted theexperiments, the proportion of farmersusing insecticide dropped from 80%

Until a couple years ago, 35-year-old Joinal Ahmad (pictured

right) grew rice on a little over half a hectare in his village

of Tatoipara, annually eking out a farm income of 2,800

Bangladeshi taka, or US$48. He and his wife of 18 years struggled to

look after their two toddler sons and put their two older daughters

through school. In 2002, Ahmad was recruited by Livelihood

Improvement Through Ecology (LITE) to test the effect of ceasing to spray ins

on his rice crop. After establishing that spraying did not improve grain yield or

he did away with insecticides. He also red

nitrogen fertilizer (urea) use by employi

color chart to guide a pplications.

While LITE hasnt made Ahmad wealt

helped him a great deal. With the money

he has been able to buy more land and b

planted area to almost two-thirds of a he

has cut his exposure to health- and environment-threatening chemicals. And he ha

doubled his annual farm income to 4,800 taka.

I can grow rice at lower cost because I use less urea and no insecticide,

explains. With the money I save, I help my family and pay for my childrens ed

A few kilometers away in Ghilatoli, 20-year-old Mohammed Mashuk Miah

above, at right), who combines rice farming with his accounting studies, enthus

the difference LITE has made to him. His savings have capitalized a rice-milling

and helped him buy an ox. So keen is he to spread the good word, he has been nonparticipating farmers on his own initiative.

I tell other farmers to do the same thing, he says. I invited 10 of my fri

trained them. They saw the faith I had in this method.

When farmers stop spraying, they save not only the purchase price of the pest

also on hiring labor and renting equipment and on often exorbitant interest

the short-term loans they once needed to cover these costs. Many farmers have u

LITE-driven savings to buy more land or better-quality clothes and food for their

and their newfound capital has allowed some to diversify into more profitable c

to 55% largely because of casual

contact with participating farmers.Our initial goal was to have 10%

of farmers in the target villages reducetheir insecticide use, he adds. Theresult is beyond our wildest dreams.

LITE farmers optimism ispalpable. The day after Orsini drewa Thai victory chant from 3,000participants the Comilla regions

120 original lead farmers plus thecurrent round of newly recruitedparticipants Dr. Jahn met theleaders to thank them for their hard

work. After another chorus of chai

yo, a couple of farmers suggestedthe organizers reciprocate with anAmerican farm song. So it wasthat an IRRI senior scientist, a

former UN scale-up expert and anAustralian reporter (yours truly)found themselves moo-moo-mooing ahastily arranged but surprisingly well-received rendition ofOld Macdonald

Had a Farm.In terms of cost-benefit, LITE

is extremely successful. Orsini

explains that the World Bank and

other funding agencies traditionallyconsider projects worthwhile if theyresult in a 13% improvement inincome. That is, for every dollar spent,the project must generate, after a

certain number of years dependingon its type, at least $1.13 of income.LITEs cost-benefit ratio is 1:4

bringing a return of $4 for every dollar

spent in the first year alone, withoutfactoring in subsequent years savings.

This will only get better with

time, enthuses Orsini. The longer

that farmers use the LITE regime, themore they will save. After 5 years, say,the ratio will be 1:20, which is trulyexceptional.

Dr. Jahn is confident that the

farmers will adhere to LITE practicesbecause, first, they saw the resultsof their own experiments in theirown fields and, second, LITE goes

straight to the bottom line. Wherefarmer field schools rely on thefarmers learning and understandingecology, he explains, LITE relies onunderstanding your wallet, which is

almost innate.The projects simplicity and

direct appeal to farmers interestsare cited by the executive directors

of both participating NGOs, AID-Comillas Rokeya Begum Shafali andDCPUKs Nurul Islam Dulu, as strongarguments for more funding. The last2 years results have been very good,

says Shafali. Now we need to explainthe project, its aims and its missionto donors so that all Bangladeshi

Double taka

farmers have a chance to par

The LITE team now has27 nongovernmental partnerimplementing the project aown expense, as LITE fundinfinished in 32 new villages

Comilla and Rangpur, whichthat nearly 4,000 new farme

being trained to perform the experiment. If additional fun

comes through, each of thesewill provide lead farmers to tnew lead farmers in five neig

villages, for a total of 160 villnew lead farmers in those 16

will train the other farmers invillage, then new farmers in fineighboring villages, and theof villages practicing LITE wi

800. And so on.Given continued support

LITE and its benefits will ripand radiate across Bangladesrice fields. Perhaps someday

an incongruous but inspiringvictory cry will ring out all ovBangladesh.

Insecticide

No leaf color chart

No insecticide

No leaf color chart

Insecticide

Leaf color chart

No insecticide

Leaf color chart

E RICE FIELD: Lead farmers partitioned theirds into quadrants receiving four differentp-management strategies.

FOUR WOMEN THRESH rice in thevillage of Sullipara, Rangpur.Farida Yasmin (left), a 17-year-old from Ghilatoli, Comilla,shows an environmental awardshe received for her role in theLITE project. Many of the farmerswives and daughters helped torun, and participated in, double-blind taste and quality testsof rice grown under LITEs fourcrop management strategies. Nodifferences were found. A Comillafarmer (below) bringing in thesheaves.


15/33


China and India together

accounted in 1999 for 38%of world population and55% of all rice consumption.

In 2000, their rice fields comprised48% of global area planted to rice and

produced 54% of the harvest.In the past year, responsibility

for representing the InternationalRice Research Institute (IRRI) has

changed hands in both countries. InSeptember 2003, Tang Shengxiangcompleted 6 years of service asIRRIs first liaison scientist for China,replaced by Zhao Kaijun. Last June

saw R.K. Singh complete 9 years asIRRI liaison scientist for India, wherehis responsibilities were assumed byJ.K. Ladha as IRRI representative.

Transition in the two giants of

the world of rice is an opportunity tocelebrate the careers of the outgoingliaison scientists and to welcome their

replacements in

these two crucialIRRI countryoffices afterfirst recallinghow the country-

office systemcame to be.

For itsfirst 3 decades,

IRRI made dowithout ongoingcountry offices.The institutesupported in-

country researchwith projectoffices that were

Summing up

set up as needed and loosely linked

to IRRIs Training and TechnologyTransfer Department and its deputydirector general for outreach. The

project offices notably in India,Indonesia, Thailand and, starting in

the mid-1980s, Vietnam, Cambodiaand Laos depended heavily onpersonal ties at IRRI headquarters inthe Philippines to energize support for

their activities.

Upgraded presenceGlenn Denning, head of technologytransfer, drew on his experience in

Indochina to champion systematizingthe institutes in-country contacts

by establishing permanent countryoffices. January 1990 saw thereorganization of the Training and

Technology Transfer Departmentinto the Training Center under DanMinnick and the new InternationalPrograms Management Office under

Dr. Denning.Existing project offices became

country offices that year, but signif-icant upgrading of IRRIs presencein-country often depended on local

initiative, as illustrated by R.K. Singhsstart as liaison scientist in 1995.

The first thing I did was shift theIRRI-India Office, which was then

located in a back house of a residentialpremises, to a more decent premises inFriends Colony, New Delhi, reportedDr. Singh (it has since moved to theNational Agriculture Science Center

near other Indian and internationalagricultural institutions). At thesame time, we upgraded our office

In the calculus of rice and global food security, China and India equal the

rest of the world combined. The role of rice research in these countries is

likewise great, as is the task of coordinating it for maximum benefit

by Peter Fredenburg

WOMEN NEAR Hefei, in the Chinese

province of Anhui, fertilize aerobicrice, a water-saving crop undergo-ing on-farm trials. Tang Shengxiang(opposite top, at left), IRRIs outgoingliaison scientist for China, checks agreenhouse trial with William Padolina(right), IRRI deputy director generalfor partnerships, and Chen Zonglong,vice president of the Yunnan Academyof Agricultural Sciences. R.K. Singh(opposite bottom, holding waterbottle), outgoing liaison scientist forIndia, shares a light moment withfarmers.


16/33


Change came with continuity on 18 June when J.K. Ladha started

as the International Rice Research Institute representative for

India. As IRRI coordinator of the Rice-Wheat Consortium for the

do-Gangetic Plains since 1999, Dr. Ladha, an Indian national, has

en a frequent traveler to his homeland during his 22 years at IRRI

adquarters in the Philippines.

I was the youngest IRS when I joined IRRI in 1982, recalled theergetic 52-year-old internationally recruited staff scientist. Because

uipment and sent local staff foraining to enhance their knowledged skills with regard to modern tools,

uipment and office protocol.IRRI-India was thus prepared

expand its list of projects fromnly a handful, according to Dr.ngh, to the current 44 researchojects implemented with 53

rticipating institutions involvingore than 270 Indian scientistsrectly and many more indirectlyall coordinated through regular

RRI-India planning and review

eetings. Improved links with theivate sector and nongovernmentalganizations supported work inomoting traditional aromatic riced organically grown and hybrid

ce, as well as facilitating on-farm

varietal trials and technology delivery.Strengthened ties with the mediaensured routine press coverage ofIRRIs activities in India.

Drawing on a decades workfrom 1985 as director of researchat Narendra Deva University of

Agriculture and Technology inFaizabad, Uttar Pradesh, Dr. Singh

was particularly active in severalprojects focused on eastern India,including research on mixedfarming systems based on rice in

rainfed lowlands and efforts to buildpartnerships with farmers throughparticipatory varietal selection (seeTaking PartinRice Today, Vol. 3,No. 2, pages 22-26). He published

research results in the booksPhysiology of Stress Tolerancein Rice (1996),Rice-growing

Environments of Eastern India: AnAgro-climatic Atlas (1999),Rainfed

Rice: A Sourcebook of Best Practicesand Strategies in Eastern India(2000), andBoro Rice (2003).

During my tenure, I have also

devoted some time to improvingindigenous scented rices in India,Dr. Singh recalled. My efforts in thisregard have helped identify a numberof improved lines, which are now

being tested in state and all-Indiacoordinated trials. Some have beenreleased by state and central varietalrelease committees.

Dr. Singh co-edited two

comprehensive books on the topic:

Aromatic Rices (2000) andATreatise on the Scented Rices of India(2003). One other book published

by Dr. Singh, Genetics and Plant

Breeding, is a manual and sourcebook for postgraduate students.A fellow of the Indian NationalAcademy of Agricultural Sciences,Dr. Singh has additionally published

dozens of papers, notes and abstractsin refereed journals, internationalproceedings and other venues. Today,he continues working to alleviate rural

poverty with the nongovernmentalorganization Nand EducationalFoundation for Rural Development.

Memorable eventsSome memorable events duringmy tenure included India becomingsignatory to the international status

of IRRI in 1996 and the IRRI-India dialogue in 1998, Dr. Singh

reminisced. A highlight of the latterevent was the luncheon meetinghosted for the IRRI director generaland scientists by our prime minister

along with his cabinet colleagues.Similarly, a highlight of Tang

Shengxiangs tenure as liaisonscientist for China was PresidentJiang Zemins formal opening of the

first International Rice Congress.The event which attracted morethan 1,000 scientists from around the

world and garnered extensive presscoverage in China took place in

Beijing in September 2002, just a year

before Dr. Tangs departure.His career with IRRI had begun

in 1980, barely half a dozen yearsafter the first tentative contacts

between the institute and China,and only 4 years after the end of theCultural Revolution. The rice scholarstudied frequently at IRRI duringthe 1980s. In 1990, a year after

becoming head of the GermplasmDepartment of the China NationalRice Research Institute in Hangzhou,Dr. Tang became the China national

coordinator of the IRRI-sponsoredInternational Network for GeneticEvaluation of Rice (INGER, seeJoint

Account with Intereston next page).Following a stint as an IRRI con-

sultant in 1996-97, Dr. Tang acceptedappointment as liaison scientist forChina which, surprisingly, did not

yet have an IRRI country office. Afrantic months preparation led in

November 1997 to an IRRI-Chinadialogue in Beijing, at which 45 ricescientists set priorities for a moreformal program of collaboration.

From its newly establishedpremises in the Beijing compound ofthe Chinese Academy of AgriculturalSciences, the IRRI-China Officeinitiated several collaborative

projects on molecular breeding,hybrid rice development and use,aerobic rice breeding, rice functionalgenomics and shuttle breeding. Jointstudies on nitrogen-use efficiency

came under the project ReachingToward Optimum Productivity.Collaborative research on exploitingcrop biodiversity for sustainable

rice-disease management developeda suite of techniques that Chinesefarmers now apply on more than 1.2million ha in the provinces of Yunnan,Sichuang and Jiangxi.

We now have 18 ongoing bilateralcollaborative projects that engage 160Chinese scientists in 38 participatinginstitutions, reported Dr. Tang.

The scientist noted that INGERgermplasm has figured in 37 conven-tional rice varieties and 28 commercialhybrids released to Chinese farmers.In the past 6 years, we arranged the

delivery of more than 220 Chineserice varieties to the International RiceGenebank at IRRI, he added.

The IRRI-China Office has beena 2-way conduit of rice information,

with Dr. Tang writing about IRRI inthe Chinese media and publishing

many scientific papers in bothChinese and English, and the officeannually shipping some 200 issuesof 18 Chinese rice-related scientific

journals to the IRRI Library. In2002, Dr. Tang was instrumentalin arranging publication, with thefinancial support of the Fujian Scienceand Technology Publishing House

in Fuzhou, of the Chinese-languageversion of the 3rd edition ofRiceAlmanac, for which he also served asone of the two chief translators.

Timely inputsAmong the many Chinese awardsreceived by IRRI scientists on Dr.Tangs watch was a 1999 first prize

from the Ministry of EducationDr. Ladha was posted to India as an internationally recruited staff

member, his new job title is IRRI representative, not liaison scientist

as when the post is filled locally.

A fellow of the Indian National Academy of Agricultural Sciences,

American Society of Agronomy, and Soil Science Society of America, Dr.

Ladha brings a wealth of research experience to the IRRI-India Office.

This will be a challenge, he said as he prepared for the move. Ima scientist, and Ill continue to look after my research. At the same

time, the job involves a lot of administration.

In China, Zhao Kaijun came to the position of liaison scientist

in October 2003 from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences in

Beijing. Having obtained his doctorate in plant genetics and breeding in

1990 from the a cademys graduate school, he taught rice biotechnology

in its Institute of Crop Breeding and Cultivation and was deputy director

of its Key Laboratory of Crop Genetics and Bree ding under the Ministry

of Agriculture.

The 42-year-old Dr. Zhao is co-holder of a U.S. provisional patent

on plants resistant to fungal disease and the process of genetic

modification that created them.

recognizing his own researchorigin and evolution of rice.

Dr. Tang is continuing tothe Hangzhou-based INGER

coordinator and will complet2002-05 term as China regiosecretary of the Society for th

Advancement of Breeding Re

in Asia and Oceania.Today, IRRI maintains c

offices in Bangladesh, CamboChina, India, Indonesia, SouKorea, Laos, Myanmar, Thail

and Vietnam, with the centraInternational Programs ManOffice serving as the Philippicountry office and will sooa country office in Nepal. Sta

consolidation brought restrufull circle as the central officeTraining Center recombined under the leadership of Mark

IRRIs success dependseffective sharing of improvednologies with stakeholders timely inputs from national pto help set research priorities

Dr. Bell. We have helped ouoffices facilitate these exchanstandardizing operating proc

but local leadership still coun

lot. Weve been fortunate to eservices of such distinguishedscientists as Dr. Singh and D

As we adapt to changing needcountry offices across Asia, I

expect that we will continue tthe dedicated liaison scientisneed.

Whos new

TAKING A BREAK during a meeting in Beijing are (from left) Mark Bell, head of the International Management Office (IPMO); Margaret Ann Jingco, IPMO administrative coordinator; Tang Shengxialiaison scientist for China; Jojo Lapitan, IPMO senior manager; and Wang Zhongqiu, IRRI-China adcoordinator. The covers of five books (below) that contain rice research by R.K. Singh.

Zhao Kaijun J.K. Ladha

. SINGH (right) with Ren Wang, IRRI deputyector general for research, and N.V. Krishnaiah,ncipal scientist in the Entomology Department ofDirectorate of Rice Research in Hyderabad, India.

IRRI


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A

certain cooperative bankgenerates resources foragricultural development bypooling its member countries

sets. The countries deposit thesesets without taking them out ofrculation at home. India, the largestpositor, has withdrawn 10 times

much as it has deposited. Manyuntries, most recently Cambodia and

ast Timor, have made withdrawalsthout first making a deposit.

This marvelous bank is the

ternational Network for Geneticvaluation of Rice (INGER), soon tolebrate 3 decades of sharing elite

rice germplasm seeds and thegenetic material they contain across

Asia and the rest of the world. Calledthe International Rice Testing

Network when it was launched in 1975by the International Rice ResearchInstitute (IRRI) and its nationalagricultural research and extension

system (NARES) partners, INGER hasserved as the recruiting office of theGreen Revolution.

Between the late 1960s and themid-1970s, IRRI developed the first

modern rice varieties, whose short,sturdy straw could bear high yields

without lodging (falling over), and

best rice varieties and advancedbreeding lines developed byNARES, IRRI and three of itssister centers in the Consultative

Group on International Agricul-tural Research (CGIAR): the

West Africa Rice DevelopmentAssociation (WARDA) theAfrica Rice Center; the Inter-

national Center for TropicalAgriculture (CIAT by its Spanish

acronym); and, until it discontinuedits rice-breeding program in the mid-

1990s, the International Institute forTropical Agriculture (IITA).

Researchers multiply germplasmmaterials and organize them intonurseries, each of which undergoes

evaluation under a particular targetenvironment. Some nurseries targeta particular ecosystem (irrigated

lowland, rainfed lowland, upland ordeepwater) and others a particular

agronomic stress (tungro virus, blast,bacterial blight, gall midge, stem borer,brown planthopper, low temperatureor various problem soils). Researchers

create new types of nurseriesas the need arises.

The INGER program atIRRI assembles nurseries

both for global use and to

meet the special needs ofAsian countries. INGERAfrica, led by IITA from themid-1980s to the mid-1990s

and now by WARDA, establisspecific nurseries for Africa. ILatin America and Caribbeanhas looked after the particula

of that region, in cooperationFondo Latinoamericano paraRiego, a public-private partneinternational research on rice

Global perspectiveINGER owes its success partits ability to work regionally wmaintaining its global perspe

has also enjoyed generous sufrom donors, notably the UniNations Development Progra(1975-96), World Bank (1991Swiss Agency for Developme

Cooperation (1995), and FedMinistry for Economic Coopeand Development/German A

for Technical Cooperation (197). Today, IRRI, WARDA an

support their INGER activititheir respective regions.

NARES rightly place a hipriority on broadening the ge

base of their national breedinprograms, and INGER contin

be an integral component of testing programs. From its inINGER has relied on a techni

advisory committee of represscientists from participating to ensure that it meets the neNARES in line with their prio

An international rice network celebrates

30 years of impressive returns from

he exchange of genetic assets

whose insensitivity to the time ofyear and corresponding lengthof day meant that they wouldgrow normally whenever they were

planted. Unlike traditional varieties,which could produce only one cropper year, modern varieties allowedtwo or even three crops annually

on a single plot of land. Breederscreated these modern varieties byhybridizing varieties from differentcountries, then selecting improvedprogeny over the years to achieve a

genetically stable, inbred cultivar.Demand for these improved varietiescame from various parts of the world,

by Edwin L. Javier

and Maria Concepcion Toledo

both to extend directly to farmers ascultivars and as parental material thatnational programs could use to breednew varieties to meet the burgeoning

demand for rice.The main role of INGER over

the years has been to assemble anddistribute rice germplasm and toanalyze, interpret and disseminate

the results of varietal evaluation anduse, both as breeding material and infarmers fields. INGER receives the

THE REARVIEW MIRROR of a motorcycle looks back on 1975,the foundation year of the International Network for Ge neticEvaluation of Rice (INGER), and two International RiceResearch Institute staffers reading up on the InternationalRice Testing Network, as it was then known. A rice nurserypackage is laid out for final contents check (below) beforebeing strapped shut (bottom) in 1978. Today, the INGERInformation Service (above) enhances a 30-year tradition ofpartnership with modern communication technology.

interestJoint account

with


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d capacities. The role of NARESas further strengthened when theouncil for Partnership on Riceesearch in Asia (CORRA), composed

senior officials of selected AsianARES, became INGERs steeringmmittee in 1999.

Janice Bautista, INGER databaseministrator, reports that India

s made the most contributionsINGER, offering 1,400 varietiestween 1985 and 2004 and receivingme 14,000 unique materials in the

me period. In all, more than 23,000nique elite varieties and breedingnes have been contributed to INGER

the four CGIAR and 79 NARESrticipants.

netic diversityany of these entries have under-

ne evaluation in more than oneursery. In its 3 decades, INGER has

stributed more than 48,000 testtries to 74 countries around the

orld. Over the years, 62 countriesve evaluated three to 6,345

lections in local yield trials. TheNGER germplasm pool has directly

pplied 667 varietal releases arounde world, each saving local breeders5 years work. A study in 1997

lculated the annual value of eachrectly released INGER variety atS$2.5 million. Without INGER,e number of rice varieties releasedorldwide would fall by a quarter.

INGER nurseries have also serveda major source of parents for

eeding. Since INGER's inception,countries generated at least 17,000

osses using INGER materials from8 countries as parents. Like directNGER releases, the resulting new

rieties using INGER parents havemproved farmers income by offering

gh yields that are stable becausee cultivars tolerate environmentalresses. They have reduced depen-nce on pesticides because they

ve multiple resistance to pests andseases. INGER has also broadenednetic diversity in farmers fields.

Less-developed countries havenefited the most from INGER.

ambodia, which missed the Greenevolution in the 1970s because ofvil strife, has