New flood-resistant rice varieties can help farmers and the environment

Researchers at the University of California, Davis in the US and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), based in the Philippines, have isolated a gene from a traditional rice variety that helps plants survive long periods of flooding. immersed in water.

Most rice plants will die if completely submerged for a few days, but the paper says that rice plants carrying this gene can survive for 2 weeks under water. Researchers at IRRI used a ' transformation ' of traditional breeding methods to introduce genes into three major local rice varieties from South Asia and began testing one of the above varieties in India. India and Bangladesh.

The article states that flood-tolerant varieties of rice may immediately affect rice growing areas of developing countries. More than a quarter of the global rice crop grown in the lowlands is likely to suffer from sudden flooding, and every year, hundreds of farmers lose their crops because of the flood, an estimated loss of more than $ 1 billion. annual. The article said that flood-tolerant rice could also help reduce the amount of pesticides used in the United States, because flood control could be used as an alternative to killing weeds.

Ngoc Thanh