From the “I love the smell of rice-a-roni in the morning” department and the Global Rice Science Partnership, we have adaptation to a warmer more CO2 laden world. It’s another “Ehrlich population bomb were all gonna starve” moment shot to hell. – Anthony
Scientists launch global scheme to boost rice yields while reducing damage to environment
Millions will escape hunger and poverty in a widening campaign to achieve global food security and deliver major environmental gains within 25 years
Hanoi, Vietnam (November 10, 2010)—One of the world’s largest global scientific partnerships for sustainable agricultural development has launched a bold new research initiative that aims to dramatically improve the ability of rice farmers to feed growing populations in some of the world’s poorest nations. The efforts of the Global Rice Science Partnership, or GRiSP, are expected to lift 150 million people out of poverty by 2035 and prevent the emission of greenhouse gases by an amount equivalent to more than 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide.
An initiative of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and led by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and its partners, GRiSP was launched in Hanoi today at the 3rd International Rice Congress. The new global initiative will lead scientists to embark on the most comprehensive attempt ever to deploy rice’s genetic diversity. Cutting-edge research aimed at discovering new rice genes and deciphering their functions will feed into accelerated efforts to break the yield barrier in rice and to breed new generations of “climate-ready” rice with flooding tolerance and other traits that are essential for adapting production in the face of climate change. The initiative is expected to boost supplies enough to reduce anticipated increases in rice prices by an average of at least 6.5% by 2020, and at least 13% by 2035.
“Given that rice is a staple food for more than half the global population and in most of the developing world, there is no question that availability of rice is equated with food security,” said Dr. Robert Zeigler, Director General of IRRI, a member of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers.
According to Zeigler, GRiSP has the potential to contribute significantly to lowering food prices, which he says should lift about 72 million people out of poverty by 2020. This effect is measured by counting the lower costs as projected income gains worth US$11 billion, thus reducing global poverty by 5% and 11% by 2035.
At the same time, GRiSP research will significantly reduce emissions of greenhouse gases from rice production through the adoption of improved irrigation methods and by avoiding deforestation. More than 1.2 million hectares of forest, wetlands, and other natural ecosystems will be saved by 2035 because rice production will not need to expand into new areas, thanks to higher rice yields.
The launch of GRiSP marks the beginning of a 5 year nearly $US600 million endeavor. While GRiSP builds on existing research, development, and funding, it requires additional new financial support to raise annual funding for rice research from around 100 million in 2011 to 139 million in 2015 to fully realize its potential.
“GRiSP is the opening gambit in a wider campaign to secure the world’s food supply within 25 years,” said Mr. Carlos Pérez del Castillo, Chair of the Board of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers. The Consortium of Centers was formed recently in a major reorganization of the CGIAR that is responsible for providing financial support for the implementation of the CGIAR Research Programs (CRPs).
“In the coming months,” he added, “the CGIAR will launch further high-quality international research programmes that form part of a comprehensive vision, with clear impact-oriented targets, for reduction in poverty and hunger, improvements in health and nutrition, and enhanced resilience of the world’s ecosystems. We welcome the CGIAR donor support for these new programs.”
The initiative will also promote revolutionary transformations in rice agronomy, processing, and policy. The overall goal will be to serve farmers and consumers by increasing yields using improved seeds and agricultural practices, and by reducing postharvest losses (estimated at 20-30 percent of developing country production).
As part of a vigorous effort to strengthen national research capacities, the program will offer hundreds of developing country professionals—at least 30 percent of them women—the opportunity to take part in degree programs and training courses.
This global partnership is led by IRRI along with AfricaRice and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and includes two French organizations, the Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD) and L’Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), as well as the Japan International Research Centre for Agricultural Sciences (JIRCAS), with hundreds of other partners worldwide representing governments, the private sector and civil society. These partners actively shaped the research agenda of GRiSP and will play key roles in its implementation. GRiSP provides an example of how the CGIAR will operate in the future and which other research programmes will emulate.
GRiSP embodies key recommendations of Never an Empty Bowl: Sustaining Food Security in Asia, an international taskforce report released in late September by IRRI and the Asia Society. Calling for new efforts to “raise and sustain the productivity of rice farmers,” the report proposes innovative mechanisms to pay for this work, including one in which rice-growing nations would fund rice research on the basis of the value of domestic production.
GRiSP—the Global Rice Science Partnership—is an international alliance with hundreds of research and development partners worldwide that represents for the first time ever, a single strategic and work plan for global rice research. GRiSP aims to reduce poverty and hunger, improve human health and nutrition, reduce the environmental footprint and enhance ecosystem resilience of rice production systems through high-quality international rice research, partnership, and leadership. The International Rice Research Institute (www.irri.org) leads GRiSP and principal partners within the CGIAR include AfricaRice and CIAT.
The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is a global partnership that unites organizations engaged in research for sustainable development with the funders of this work. The funders include developing and industrialized country governments, foundations, and international and regional organizations. The work they support is carried out by 15 members of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers, in close collaboration with hundreds of partner organizations, including national and regional research institutes, civil society organizations, academia, and the private sector. www.cgiar.org – http://cgiarconsortium.cgxchange.org.
Cutting-edge research aimed at discovering new rice genes and deciphering their functions will feed into accelerated efforts to break the yield barrier in rice and to breed new generations of “climate-ready” rice with flooding tolerance and other traits that are essential for adapting production in the face of climate change. The initiative is expected to boost supplies enough to reduce anticipated increases in rice prices by an average of at least 6.5% by 2020, and at least 13% by 2035.
When zombie rice is stalking the earth, breaking barriers, breeding new generations, and flooding tolerance, you’ll be sorry.
hmmm….
‘Cutting-edge research aimed at discovering new rice genes and deciphering their functions will feed into accelerated efforts to break the yield barrier in rice and to breed new generations of “climate-ready” rice’
Climate-ready sounds as reassuring (not!) as Roundup-ready….what some folks
call “Franken foods”. It sounds like a lot of money will be changing hands
similar to other climate-related, er, research.
And, in the interest of productivity, the farmers will no longer be allowed to farm
(leaving it to big Agribusiness), thereby losing what little income they currently have.
Hopefully someone sees through this before another seed stock is reduced in variety and diversity….burned to a GRiSP….sad….
Well if your ignore the Climate BS, (and hope its not a GM frankenfood) then anything that helps farmers to farm better, get higher yields, lower wastage, etc is generally a good move.
This sort of thing has been going on for about 200 years, just without the silly press releases.
Has anyone else noticed that,
significantly reduce emissions of greenhouse gases
and
significantly increased emergence of lefty taxes
almost rhyme.
That I’m afraid is the best I can do with this one. When will they admit that they lost the climate wars and now it’s just Marxism vs democracy.
Check back in a few years to see who won.
One has to hope this doesn’t mean that they will do to rice what they did to GMO Corn… turn it into empty calories.
“Let them eat cardboard” II.
One wonders what Norman Borlaug might have been able to accomplish with access to that kind of dough.
This sounds like GMO. Certainly hope not. That assault on nature should be terminated (like the terminator seeds now developed). The GMO Roundup Ready soybean has now produced super weeds that Roundup can not stop. Companies destroying food supplies need to be vigorously investigated. The Europeans actually burn the test fields of GMO crops, but we apparently sit by and hope our watchdog agencies will protect us. Unfortunately those revolving doors usually slam in the face of the public not the guilty.
Improving rice yield per hectare is a good objective. It will definitely help reduce poverty in many poorer countries by stabilizing the price of rice, the main staple food for many Asians. But adding “climate ready” to the rice is just meant for rent-seeking and to attract more funding, more loans, more subsidies, from many governments and foreign aid bodies, to help “fight man-made warming and climate change” scam.
Reduce GHG?“Doubling the CO2 concentration from 330 to 660 μmol CO2/mol air resulted in a 32 % increase in grain yield.”
And even if rising CO2 caused any significant increase to global temperatures, such increase occurs LEAST in tropical regions thus increasing the latitude (potential growing area) and growing season for rice, (and many other food crops).
So basically we can do better than them by just waiting and not doing anything at all.
Besides, as anyone ought to know by now, whether it is genetically designed or not, putting any food crop into a one strain ‘basket’ is a very BAD idea. “OOOPS! We didn’t realize disease ‘X’ was going affect this. We’re sorry.. ”
Now if I was a conspiracy theorist I might suspect that people like John Ehrlich might push a given genetically designed crop for the sole purpose of actually being able to cause a world food shortage and thereby starve off the unwashed masses of the third world who are hurting mother Gaia. But I’m no conspiracy theorist.
“climate change” research with a pratical benefit to mankind! Whatever will they think of next?
Maybe it’s not worse than we thought after all.
Do I understand this correctly?
Some NGOs are going to get $600 million to teach the Japanese, Vietnamese (in Hanoi?), Thais, and Indians to grow rice?
Well. That’s certainly a novel idea.
PS – I wonder why the meeting wasn’t held in Saigon rather than Hanoi, since after all the Mekong Delta is the rice basket for the entire country.
I wonder if Lysenko is helping with the grant applications?
Very minor impact when you consider that global population increases by approx. 76 million annually.
UNFCCC website once had an article that emphasized the methane contribution of rice paddy agriculture, stating that this represented the single great source of anthorpogenic greenhouse gas production.
“Using satellite data, investigators determined that wetlands contribute from 53% to 58% of global methane emissions and that rice paddies are responsible for more than a quarter of that output. ”
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1953751,00.html#ixzz14vNkPpZZ
I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole enterprise ends up with a snap, crackle and pop!
On the other hand, I can see them makeing a new brand of cereal: Rice GRiSPies.
Roundup Ready Canola is already on its way to becoming a pest beyond measure here in Saskatchewan. Lesson learned.
Rice production must be halted. It is the leading producer of methane.
why not let them eat cake.
This is a very fine initiative. Let’s not knock it. Its a win-win situation, more food, less habitat loss. It too bad that people at Greenpeace and similar organizations have been so hostile to new varieties such as “golden rice” which would have stopped (and still may stop) thousands of children in third-world countries from going blind from Vitamin A deficiency.
I wonder how much rice yields per acre will increase (or have increased) because of the extra carbon dioxide they are getting? Does anyone know of any quantitative estimates on this?
Wonder if they’ll be selecting for cold tolerance as well as disease resistance and yield.
I certainly hope so!
‘s about time.
Great just what we need…more GMO. Let me guess, Monsanto is gonna have a hand in this in one way or another.
I’m all for lifting people out of poverty. One problem is, just about everything proposed by the AGWers is counterproductive.
This article says they hope to reduce rice prices by 13% by 2035.
http://www.fao.org/economic/est/publications/rice-publications/rice-market-monitor-rmm/en/
Rice price index : 2005 125, 2006 137, 2007 161, 2008 295, 2009 253, 2010 (Jan-Jun) 222.
Does anyone really think that a 13% reduction over 25 years would even be noticed?
My sneaking suspicion is that this whole thing is yet another counterproductive effort – ie, it will keep more people in poverty for longer than necessary – but I would have to think about it a bit more to substantiate that.
So, yet again the politicians are allowed their useless input.
They appear to be bereft of what is actually happening, right under their snouts.
Err if are they talking about a rice breeding program what exactly is their point. There have been IMF and WHO funded vegetable and cereal seed breeding programs in place since just about before time began to assist developing countries increase their produce production. International collaboration is also an important part of these breeding programs where breeding expertise is supplied from developed countries. Also for accelerating seed multiplication across seasons. Oh and all breeding programs are about increasing yield and disease resistance.