An adventure in applied science - IRRI books - International Rice ...

116 History of the International Rice Research Institutemodest percentage of its rice land planted to modern varieties, the governmentis making a strong effort to increase rice production and to expand the nation’sexport markets.Quite a different story can be told about India. Its interest in short-staturedindica rice varieties started in 1964 when S.V. Chalam, a senior agriculturalofficer in the Government of India, visited IRRI. When shown around theexperimental fields, he asked Moomaw, IRRI’s agronomist, which rice varietywas the highest yielding. “Taichung Native 1,” Moomaw replied. Chalamsaid, “Please give me two kilograms of seed of that variety and I shall plant itin India.” He received the seed, it was planted at home and it turned out to beso successful that in early 1965, Ralph Cummings, Sr., then director of theRockefeller Foundation Agricultural Program in India, arranged to purchaseone ton of Taichung Native 1 seed from IRRI. By that time, Chalam had becomethe manager of the National Seeds Corporation in India. He was able to get 5more tons of the seed from Taiwan in October 1965, and the following year, theTaiwan Government gave India 60 t of the variety. Chalam was an enthusiasticand industrious agriculturist and did an outstanding job of multiplying anddistributing Taichung Native 1 seed in India. By the dry season of 1967, morethan a million hectares of the variety had been planted in that country.By early 1966, IR8 and other IRRI selections were being tested in India.Because the trials showed that IRRI lines generally were more resistant todisease attack than was Taichung Native 1, that variety was replaced by IR8.In mid-December, the Ford Foundation bought 10 t of IR8 seed in the Philippinesfor India, and in February 1967 the Rockefeller Foundation shippedanother 10 t to that country. By 1968-69, India was growing about 2.7 millionha of modern varieties. Concurrently with the introductions from abroad, ofcourse, the country was breeding superior varieties that were multiplied anddistributed to farmers. Today, India devotes over 15 million ha of land tomodern rice varieties, and for the past several years, has been self-sufficient inthat grain. Its success is the result partly of using improved managementpractices for the newer varieties and partly of having had good monsoon rainsin recent years.Any discussion of the initial varietal improvement operations at IRRIshould indicate that, given sufficient time, what the Institute achieved in itsearly years in all likelihood would have taken place eventually through otheragencies and by other means. However, the gains would have come aboutmuch later and the spread of modern rice varieties throughout the worldwould have been much slower. It, took an international, nonpolitical, wellfundedorganization like IRRI, with a talented and dedicated scientific staff, tohave a major impact on and to reinvigorate and stimulate into action many ofthe earlier established rice breeding programs in tropical Asia and elsewhere.IRRI has received some criticism for naming its own varieties. I believe, asmany others do, that the Institute was correct in naming its released varietiesat a time when it was establishing a reputation. Aside from the scientificadvantage of international identification of new cultivars and of their use inbreeding later varieties elsewhere, IRRI, as the first of the international