Institutions for rice research

Abdul Bayes | Published: August 09, 2016 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

The main institutions for rice research in our country are the Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI), the Bangladesh Institute of Nuclear Agriculture (BINA) and the Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU), Mymensingh. Besides, the botany and biochemistry departments at various universities conduct basic and strategic research but their contribution to developing improved varieties has remained marginal.
The major achievement of rice research in Bangladesh, as in other Asian countries, has been the introduction of improved varieties.Â By 2001, BRRI released plenty of rice varieties for different agro-ecological conditions while BINA and BAU released a few varieties. The characteristics of the rice varieties produced by BRRI sheds some interesting insights.
Almost half of the varieties released by BRRI apply for the dry season. These are advanced lines developed at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and other national agricultural research systems, and found suitable for Bangladesh when tested under the International Network for Genetic Evaluation of Rice (INGER). On the other hand, the crosses for most of the varieties for the wet season were made by BRRI. It shows that for the irrigated ecosystem, countries can depend on international spill-over effects of technologies as good water control makes them widely adaptable. However, for the less favourable rain-fed ecosystem, breeding needs to be done locally to take care of the location-specific agro-ecological and climatic conditions.
Before releasing for the market, breeders have looked not only for yield but also for traits such as resistance to insects and diseases, grain quality, plant height, and growth duration. For example, varieties released in the 1970s had medium resistance to tungro virus, but had no capacity to resist most other diseases and insects. The varieties released in 1980s had better resistance to yellow stemborer, leaf blight, and blast, along with a mild resistance to brown plant hopper and sheath blight. In the 1990s, the traits of variable growth duration and plant height were given higher priority in the variety release decisions in order to suit parcels of land located in different elevations (which determine duration of moisture availability and flooding depth). Many varieties released in 1990s have shorter plant height, better grain quality and a shorter maturity period than the varieties released in the 1970s. The shorter maturity varieties helped farmers to cultivate non-rice crops in the rice-based farming systems and, thus, enabling them to improve cropping intensity and increase yield in subsequent non-rice crops, such as wheat. In the 2000s, varieties for vulnerable areas such as drought-prone, saline and excessive waterlogging were developed.
It is often observed that, in the face of insects and diseases, a new variety is released to replace an old variety. But there is no guarantee that the new variety will surely be high yielding variety or its yield level would be higher. The early variety for the dry season that had the highest yield was BR-3 released in 1973. The yield potential of this variety was surpassed only in 1994 with the release of Brridhan29 (BR-29) demonstrating an average yield of 7.5 tons/ha in multi-location trials. On the other hand, the variety that gives the highest yield for the amon season, BR-11, was released in 1980.
In the light of the discussions above, we may classify the modern varieties (MVs) into three groups:
MV-1: The first-generation varieties released in the 1970s which, despite high yield, had relatively low resistance to insects and
diseases.
MV-2:Â Â Â The second-generation varieties released during the 1980s, which have improved resistance to pest and diseases and better grain quality, but no yield advantages compared to the first generation.
MV-3:Â Â Â The third-generation varieties released since 1990, which produceÂ Â plants shorter in height with the capacity to yield high and have the capacity to increase
production.
Our farmers started cultivating MVs in the early 1960s. At that time, the Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) introduced, through cooperatives, the cultivation of Paijam (known as Masuri in India) for the wet season and Purbachi for the dry season. The seeds of these varieties were imported from outside.
According to researchers, whether or not farmers would be encouraged to adopt MVs, depend on a number of socio-economic factors. But they have also shown that the existing dominance of small and marginal farmers in the agrarian structure did not deter the adoption of MVs in Bangladesh. On the other hand, researches have revealed that the rate of adoption of MV is the highest among the small and tenant farmers. This observation does not lend support to the conventional wisdom of the forerunners in rural researches.
However, among the major constraints to adoption are technical factors such as non-availability of irrigation facilities for the dry season, and the topographic condition of the land-parcels. For example, one-thirds of our cultivated lands have a flood-depth of 30 cm and these are favourable for growing semi-dwarf modern varieties. On the other hand, we have 40 per cent of the cultivated land with depth of flood at 30-90 cm, and where modern varieties of medium heights are suitable to grow. Needless to mention, most of the lands in these areas have been brought under MVs. However, the rest one-third of the cultivated land in Bangladesh is unfavourable for the growth of MV paddy. Besides topographic condition, another constraint to the adoption of MVsÂ is the intrusion of salinity into the soil.
The diffusion of MVs is mainly dependent on the expansion of irrigation facilities.Â The rapid spread of irrigation began in the early 1980s when irrigation system was left to the private sector.Â Beginning in 1986, and sequentially, the government removed bans on imports of agricultural inputs and reduced import duties on the imports of agricultural machinery. These two steps helped reduction of irrigation costs and the growth of an irrigation market in rural areas and also went to invigorate the visibly spread irrigation programmes of the 1990s. Apart from irrigation facilities, two other factors helped the spread of MVs: first, improved linkages between agricultural research and extension; secondly, cooperation between NGOs, private sector and the government.
The writer is a former Professor of Economics at Jahangirnagar University.
abdulbayes@yahoo.com