DEVELOPMENT-ASIA: Hybrid Rice Ruins Genetic Diversity — Critics

By Marwaan Macan-Markar Reprint | | Print |

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Aug 6 2002 (IPS) - While Asia’s premier rice research body pushes ahead with plans to sow more hybrid rice seeds in paddy fields across the continent, critics accuse it of ruining the diversity of the Asian rice fields.

At the heart of this dispute — between the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) based in Los Banos, the Philippines, and its critics — is the suggestion that the IRRI is breeding a monoculture across rice paddy fields in the region through its hybrid products.

For one such critic, Jacques-Chai Chomthongdi, there is no kernel of truth in the argument IRRI extends to convince farmers to switch to hybrid rice — that its products are environmentally sound and friendly to farming communities.

“IRRI fails to talk about the amount of pesticides, herbicides and fertilisers farmers have to use for a successful crop of hybrid rice,” says Jacques-Chai, a research associate at Focus on the Global South, a Bangkok-based think tank.

“High chemical inputs cannot be controlled. It affects the rice fields and the surrounding land,” says Jacques-Chai.

According to another dissenting voice, IRRI’s approach to developing hybrid rice seeds goes against the grain of how farming communities have often pursued such a task.

“IRRI is keen on producing and promoting few hybrid seeds, creating a monoculture on the fields. But farmers have always developed diverse seeds,” says Witoon Lianchamroon, director of BioThai, a Bangkok-based biodiversity lobby.

Yet IRRI experts are convinced that farmers stand to gain by switching to the hybrid rice seeds. “The seeds we are producing ensure high yields and thus enable farmers to use their land efficiently,” says Mahabub Hossain, head of IRRI’s social sciences division.

For one, adds Hossain, the farmers will be able to reduce their land use for rice while getting a bigger harvest, and “be able to release land for other crops, helping agricultural diversification.”

What is more, Hossain views IRRI’s efforts as a case of science complementing the work of seed development by farming communities.

“What we are doing through technology is accelerating the process of producing rice seeds for the farmers. In the end, the farmers gain, since we are not driven by profit,” says Hossain.

And for those who accuse IRRI of stomping on the diversity of rice seeds, Hossain points to the seed bank that the organisation set up in the 1960s to ensure seed availability at a future date.

“We have 120,000 rice seeds,” he asserts. “The bank keeps it for the farmers, in case they want to use them again. This is a preservation of biodiversity.”

IRRI’s views have not been lost on an increasing number of governments in Asia, as reports of spreading hybrid rice fields emerge.

Since 1994, 23 hybrid rice varieties have been developed by IRRI and distributed to nine Asian countries, including India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Vietnam.

Asia is the largest rice producing region in the world, with an expected output of 543.6 million tonnes of paddy this year, according to the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), a U.N. agency.

China tops this list, followed by India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Thailand. China is also the global leader in developing hybrid rice seeds, having begun work in the early 1960s. Currently, nearly half of its 15 million hectares of paddy lands are sown with hybrid seeds.

Yet the onward march of hybrid rice fields through Asia fails to impress non-governmental organisations (NGOs) like the Genetic Resources Action International (GRAIN) and the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI).

Hybrid rice presents a “serious threat,” reports GRAIN in a study titled: ‘Hybrid Rice in Asia: an Unfolding Threat.’

“It is an extremely uniform crop and the varieties available in Asia rely almost exclusively on a single wild relative and only a handful of maintainer or restorer lines,” the report says, referring to the strains used for the hybrid rice process.

In China, there has been a 46-fold reduction in local varieties being grown due to the rapid spread of hybrid rice since the 1960s, it adds.

“Rice breeding has been the affair of farmers for thousands of years. In the process of collecting, selecting, exchanging, conserving and experimenting, they have come up with well over 100,000 varieties with different characteristics,” says the report.

In fact, two much sought after rice varieties, basmati from India and jasmine from Thailand, reflect such an effort. Both are the products of rice farmers who developed the seeds using traditional knowledge.

According to IPGRI, rice production in Asia during the Green Revolution – when output increased 42 percent from 1968-1981 due to the introduction of high yield varieties bread by IRRI – was possible due to diversity.

“The varieties that made this possible originated with farmers or from bred varieties from more than 20 countries in Asia,” it states.

“It is only through conservation and use of such resources that we can guarantee the continued availability of the genetic material that is essential to ensure future advances in plant breeding,” IPGRI says.

Hossain, the IRRI expert, understands some of these sentiments, saying that his organisation is not aiming to undermine biodiversity.

“Our work as breeders should remain in the public domain. We are not trying to destroy farmers or their lifestyles or biodivesity,” he says.

For him in fact, the greater threat is the increasing presence of private companies taking on the mantle of rice breeders. “They are only interested in profits. Farmers will have to pay heavily for their products.”

That concern is not misplaced, as available records reveal that by September 2000 close to 609 patents on rice genes had been granted to rice breeders working for multinational companies like Monsanto, DuPont, Aventis and Sygenta.

But biodiversity activists like Witoon are not convinced, arguing that IRRI is “harming genetic diversity” through its production and promotion of a monoculture.

“If this continues, farmers will lose their sustainable forms of farming,” he said.