Waterproof versions of popular varieties of rice, which can withstand 2 weeks of complete submergence, have passed tests in farmers fields with flying colors. Several of these varieties are now close to official release by national and state seed certification agencies in Bangladesh and India, where farmers suffer major crop losses because of flooding of up to 4 million tons of rice per year. This is enough rice to feed 30 million people.
In this video, Dave Mackill, breeder for the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI; http://beta.irri.org )
explains to farmers in the village of Naugaon in the Indian state of Orissa that the popular rice variety Swarna with the Sub1 gene (that confers the flood tolerance gene) peforms the same as Swarna without the Sub1 gene except that it can withstand prolonged flooding.
See more on flood-tolerant rice at http://beta.irri.org/news/bulletin/2008.46/ , at http://www.irri.org/timelapse.asp and http://beta.irri.org/news/index.php/200809084903/frontpage/pr/Latest-Press-Re...
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