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

182 History of the International Rice Research Instituteequipment and has already corrected many defects of its original models. IRRImachinery design, testing, and industrial extension programs are, withoutquestion, a real success and have brought to the small rice growers of Asiaextremely useful equipment that has saved them much backbreaking labor.The IRRI power tiller, moreover, has greatly reduced the turnaround time forfarmers engaged in multiple cropping.Publications programIRRI's Office of Information Services (OIS) has developed the largest publicationsprogram of any of the 13 international agricultural research centers in theCGIAR system. Although from the start the Institute prepared a detailed andhighly informative annual report and published technical bulletins, the proceedingsof its symposia, and The IRRI Reporter (which started out as abimonthly publication but later became a quarterly), much of the expansiontook place in the last 8 years. To demonstrate this change, comparisons aremade here between the program in 1972 and in 1980-81.In 1972, the only senior staff member of the OIS was Breth, who served aseditor and head of the Office. The rest of the department consisted of anassistant editor, a graphic designer, two artist illustrators, one head photographer,two assistant photographers, and a rice information assistant (to handlegroups of visitors). Thus, the OIS had a total staff of nine.Joyce C. Torio replaced Breth as head of OIS in 1974. She left IRRI at the endof 1978. Since 1979, the Office has been headed by Thomas R. Hargrove, whohas the title of editor. There are two other full-time editors, Walter G. Rockwoodand William H. Smith, and one visiting editor. The total senior stafftherefore numbers four, as compared to one in 1972. There are more than 30junior staff members, comprising two assistant editors, one editorial assistant,one research assistant, ten graphics and design specialists, four illustrators, sixprinters, and six photographers. Hence, the OIS has more than tripled in sizeduring the 9-year period from 1972 to 1981.Considering the small staff in 1972, the output was truly remarkable. Thatyear, in addition to preparing the Annual Report for 1972 (238 pages), the OISsent out 55,000 copies of IRRI publications, including 28,000 copies of FieldProblems of Tropical Rice (which has proved to be IRRI's most popular publicationwith several hundred thousand copies distributed and translations intoseveral languages). In 1972 also, the Office published a book entitled Rice,Science and Man, the proceedings of a conference held on the occasion of IRRI’S10th Anniversary Celebration in April 1972. It also published Rice Breeding, theproceedings of IRRI’s symposium on that topic and the first major symposiumproceedings to be published and distributed entirely by IRRI. The 1972publications of IRRI included the 134-page bulletin Virus Diseases of Rice, aTraining Manual for Rice Production, a Manual for Field Collectors of Rice, and thebulletin Techniques for Field Experiments with Rice: Layout/Sampling/Sources ofError. In addition, the OIS issued The IRRI Reporter and edited innumerablepapers written by IRRI scientists for publication in professional journals.