On Oct. 25, HZAU held a conference of the key project of Green Super Rice Cultivars Breeding, themed as Ten Years of Green Super Rice, with the fruitful achievements introduced and presented. Main chiefs of the project, officials from Ministry of Science & Technology and Ministry of Agriculture, and experts at home and abroad, totaled 150, attend the meeting.
Faced with tightening resource constraints, severe environmental pollution and ecosystem degradation, Chinese scientists originally propose the idea of Green Super Rice, which not only refers to new cultivars of green traits, but also envisions the production pattern of high yield & high efficiency and ecological safety, and the trend of resource conservation and environment friendliness. The goal of developing Green Super Rice is “less pesticides, less fertilizers, water saving and stress resistance, high yield and superior quality, increasing productivity of medium-to-low yielding lands”, which exactly corresponds to the green development strategy of China.
Over the last decade, centred on the idea of Green Super Rice, Chinese and overseas scientists have made significant progress and remarkable achievements in such studies and practice as cultivation theory, breeding technology system, discovery of green traits genes and germplasm innovation, cultivation and application of new cultivars, and efficient cultivation techniques and management models.
Additionally, a platform has been built for efficient and precise identification and evaluation on green traits, by which amounts of green trait genes and breeding materials were discovered and identified. A database of 3,000 rice genome sequencing has been established. 63 national invention patents have been applied, of which 23 patents were authorized. Cooperation has been strengthened between rice breeding networks in different ecological areas and R & D institutions, and a group of talents of molecular breeding technology have been trained. Pivotal techniques of Green Super Rice cultivation have been built up, including the technique of rice transplanting with machine, production mechanization of ratooning rice, precise water- and fertilizer-saving technology, and straw application and direct seeding.
In recent five years, 65 new rice cultivars with multiple green traits (resistant to 2-3 main pathogens or water saving & stress resistance, high yield and superior quality) have been bred, among which 26 were authorized with protection rights of new plant varieties and 31 were applied for the variety protection rights. Over 20 sterile and restorer lines of multiple green traits have been developed. The extending areas of those new varieties add up to 90 million mu (=6,000,000ha).
Translated by Zeng Pengling
Proofread by Guo Haiyan
Original Text:http://news.hzau.edu.cn/2017/1027/50526.shtml
