User:Ruyingdong
Hybrid Rice
[edit]Potential threat
[edit]In china, the reputation of hybrid rice is miserable. In fact, most of the crop are used to feed livestocks and poor people. Poor disease and pest resistance have occured on the rice. Hybrid system involving limits on certain characteristics has prevented researchers finding a way to cure this problem. Moreover, hybrid rice has more frequency on having"incidence of stem borer, white back plant hopper, leaf roller, bacterial blight, sheath blight, and virus diseases".[1] "downey mildew, false smut, and kernel smut" [2]occured on hybrid rice more. Therefore, there is a huge increase pesticide using on Hybrid rice than others. For example,in "Hunan Province", compared to normal crop, extra 31% of pesticide was used in hybrid rice.[3]Breeding process itself is also a limitation of development of hybrid rice. The cultivation of seed and high-skilled labor cost lots of money in the beginning, causing twenty percent of government avenue solvng the gap. According to saying from famous chinese scientist yuanlong ping, Two line systems are needed to build in the future due to the limited area of plateau. Most importantly, the lack of genetic diversity has been the major question needed to solve.
Private seeding company also has challenges dealing with hybrid rice because the process of cultivating them is very time-consuming and expensive. For example, Cargill company purchased the seed from China's government in the 1980s, the seed was produced commercially until 1992s.There are still more challenges facing in this area such as "inferior grain quality; inadequate disease/insect resistance in the first generation of hybrids; inconsistent and low seed yield; inadequate supply of pure seed of parental lines; and the high cost of seed."[4]Moreover, the IRRI policy which is a policy that is freesharing is actually limited the development of hybrid rice research.The information of technology is blocked from countries and companies, preventing the way of hybrid rice to success.
In economical and political way, the problem that hybrid rice brought is still considerable. Farmers lost their rights because the seed won't exist after harvest. They are controlled by big seeding companies. hybrid rice for whole country is contolled by a few seeding company, bringing food safety problems.
Future Directions
[edit]For future research, grain quality and resistance of insect disease have to be enhanced. Compared with Hyvs, yield of hybrids are boosted by enhancing agronomic management. Moreover, "hybrid seed production capability of parental lines" and "development of hybrids possessing higher yield potential than NPT inbred lines"[5] needs to be enhanced. In IRRI-ADB project, more researchers and workers need to be more strengh and professional. Seed companies need to invest money on stuff and research, finding the most stable way to seed production and potential way to market. The Governement is also encouraged to polish policy or money that can improve or boost the research of hybrid rice.
Conclusion
[edit]Hybrid rice is a scientific breakthrough in agriculture. However, worldwide, there is only minimal impact to improve production rate. The beginning of production requires huge time and money that government or company might can't afford. More pesticides are needed to use in order to control the disease and pests. Asia controlled all the scientific breakthrough about hybrid rice but never shared with the world. In the future, hybrid rice will be controlled by a few companies instead of public institute or government, thus letting farmers losing their rights. Nevertheless, lots of scientific experiments are shown that hybrid rice will have tremendous help to people and society if keep researching.
- ^ Wto. “Hybrid Rice in Asia: An Unfolding Threat.” GRAIN, https://www.grain.org/article/entries/34-hybrid-rice-in-asia-an-unfolding-threat.
- ^ Wto. “Hybrid Rice in Asia: An Unfolding Threat.” GRAIN, https://www.grain.org/article/entries/34-hybrid-rice-in-asia-an-unfolding-threat.
- ^ Wto. “Hybrid Rice in Asia: An Unfolding Threat.” GRAIN, https://www.grain.org/article/entries/34-hybrid-rice-in-asia-an-unfolding-threat.
- ^ Progress and Issues in Development and Use of Hybrid Rice in the Tropics - S.S. Virmani, http://www.fao.org/3/Y4751E/y4751e0g.htm.
- ^ Progress and Issues in Development and Use of Hybrid Rice in the Tropics - S.S. Virmani, http://www.fao.org/3/Y4751E/y4751e0g.htm.