China: Breakthrough in saltwater rice cultivation

For the first time rice from rice grown with seawater diluted on a commercial scale went into Chinese people's feast after the country's scientists achieved a breakthrough thanks to the efforts of farmers and researchers. , government and business. This type of rice is not grown in traditional fields irrigated with fresh water but on a beach on the Yellow Sea coast in Qingdao, Shandong Province.

China has more than 1 million square kilometers of abandoned land because it cannot grow well in areas with high salinity or alkalinity. Agricultural scientist Yuan Longping, who has been dubbed the "father of hybrid rice" in China, recently told the country's media that if one-tenth of that area was planted with salt-tolerant rice, It is possible to increase China's rice production to nearly 20%, equivalent to about 50 million tons of food, enough to feed 200 million people.

Yield of saline rice exceeds 4.5 tons / ha.

A research group, led by Mr. Yuan (87 years), recently nearly doubled the productivity of rice grown by seawater. Previously, this rice variety had low productivity, so it could not be grown on a large scale. In the 1970s, worried about raising the world's largest population and growing rapidly, the Chinese government began searching for rice varieties that could be grown in saline soils.

A major discovery by Chen Risheng, a scientist working in Guangdong province, is to find wild red rice varieties in mangrove forests in Zhanjiang. After decades of selecting traits, genetic breeding and genetic screening, scientists across China created at least 8 varieties of rice, but the yield of these varieties is still low, only 2 tons / ha. , equivalent to one third of normal rice productivity and not enough for large-scale cultivation.

Last month, in the country's largest saline soil field in Qingdao, the yield of saltwater rice exceeded 4.5 tons / ha, the Chinese press reported. Yuan Ce Biological Technology, a partner of Yuan's research group, opened an online store from August this year to sell 'Yuan Mi' rice (named after the project's leading scientist). . Each pound of rice Yuan Mi costs 50 yuan (over 170,000 dong), 8 times higher than the price of ordinary rice. Rice is packed into bags of 1kg, 2kg and 10kg. Last month, nearly 1,000 people ordered and 6 tons of rice were sold from August until now, said sales manager of Yuan Ce. 'Our revenue target by the end of this year is 10 million yuan,' said the manager.