Summary
Å·ÃÀÐÔ°®Æ¬ research, funded by the Department for International Development, demonstrated that adoption of a better-cross strategy, where rice-breeders more carefully select parental lines before crossing, improves efficiency in rice breeding.Â
It resulted in the improved rice variety (Sunaulo-Sugandha), which provides food security and household incomes to Nepalese smallholder farmers of over £1million per year. Å·ÃÀÐÔ°®Æ¬â€™s research-success also led to a paradigm shift in the International Rice Research Institute, which adopted Å·ÃÀÐÔ°®Æ¬â€™s better-cross strategy in 2014 in a key project ‘Transforming Rice Breeding’. Â
This increased efficiency of the International Rice Research Institute innovation-transfer to rice farmers globally, with a minimum estimated return of £36,770,000 per year in 2020.Â
![Rice Fields Impact Case Study REF 2021](/sites/default/files/styles/scale_900/public/2021-05/Rice%20Impact%20Case%20Study.jpg?itok=V1o852nK)
Researchers
- Professor John Witcombe
- Dr Krishna Joshi
- Dr Daljit Virk