Nature-friendly hybrid rice variety developed
Bangalore, Nov 26 (UNI) In what could be a major boon to the farmers, scientists at the University of Agriculture Sciences (UAS), Bangalore, have developed a nature-friendly hybrid variety of rice, which not only consumes substantially less water but can also take Indian farmers to the Credit Emission Reduction (CER) trade at the international arena.
A team of agricultural scientists from the Department of Genetic and Plant Breeding of the UAS have developed ‘Aerobic Rice’ uuccessfully cross breeding a local variety and IR64 variety procured from the Institute of International Rice Research, Philippines.
Aerobic rice consumed half the amount of water, had longer rots than the conventional variety that helped better absorption of water and facilitated better air ventilation. This special character of the new variety prevented the process of methanogenesis, in which green house gases were released due to decomposition of organic matter.
Dr H E Shashidhar, Professor and Head, Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, informed UNI that usually methane was produced during flooded rice cultivation by the anaerobic decomposition of organic matter in the soil, but the new variety’s lengthy roots, three times more than the conventional crop, helped to prevent the process of methanogenesis without oxygen. It did not need flooding
of water at any stage, thereby avoiding the release of methane into the atmosphere.
He said cultivation of paddy contributed to about 20 to 25 per cent of methane gases emitted into the atmosphere. The intensive use of Aerobic rice variety prevented the release of greenhouse gases like methane and nitrous oxide. While the conventional rice crop needed about 5,000 litres per kg, the new variety needed only half of it.
Mr.Shashidhar said the UAS scientists were currently engaged in conducting field trials of the new variety at six places –Bangalore, Chhattisgarh, Cuttack, Faizalabad, Coimbatore and Hazaribagh and would be commercially made available next year. The UAS had developed six varieties of Aerobic rice, which could be sown directly in the field and needed no transplantation. The new variety gave yield on par with the traditional varieties and would be ready for harvesting between 120 and 130 days.
He said that after developing the new variety, scientists were now involved in exploration of drawing carbon credits and entering the over 100 billion US Dollar CER Trade at the global level.
Entering CER trade involved a laborious exercise and a dedicated mechanism needed to be created for the purpose. The department had approached the Union Environment and Forests Ministry to take the process forward and get the Carbon Credit Certificates for contributing to reduction in emission of greenhouses gases, which caused global warming, he added.
He said Indian farmers, facing a crisis now, would not only
benefit from the use of the new variety, but could also earn foreign xchange by selling carbon credit certificates for contributing to eduction in global warming. ”Concerted efforts by NGOs, Government agencies and the farming community can go a long way in achieving the goal.” //EOM//
Posted by Dr.Y.Bala Murali Krishna
