Discovering a new kind of rice gene for high yield

On December 3, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) announced that scientists have discovered the amazing ability of a new type of rice gene that can significantly enhance the productivity of a salary crop. Real world leading this.

According to breeders working in the Philippines, the first tests on Indica long grain rice , one of the most popular varieties of rice, show that the yield of this variety may increase from 13 to 36. % when implanted with the Spike gene , opens up the prospect of creating new rice varieties for high productivity that people are looking for.

Tsutomu Ishimaru, head of an IRRI project on Spike gene development, said many different varieties of rice have been transplanted with this gene and tested in regions in Asia.

Dr. Tsutomu Ishimaru.(Photo: IRRI)

Mr. Ishimaru confirmed that Spike gene will help develop hybrid rice that can guarantee food security in the future. However, scientists have not yet determined the time to put into mass use of rice varieties with this gene.

Gene Spike was first discovered by Japanese breeder Nobuya Kobayashi in 1989 after a period of research on Japonica rice variety, which is mainly grown in Indonesia and East Asia region with a total production accounting for 10% of rice production. Global.

Later, a group of scientists at IRRI conducted this gene transplant for Indica rice that was also popular in Asia and discovered the outstanding ability mentioned above.

This is considered an important finding because rice is one of the world's leading food crops today and half the global population uses rice as their daily food. Most of them are Asian people, where there are 640 million people living in poverty.

According to calculations by scientists, in order to stabilize food prices at 300 USD / ton, the world needs to produce about 8-10 million tons more rice per year.

Currently, Asia supplies up to 90% of global rice production.