Summary
ÑÇÖÞÉ«°É 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. ÑÇÖÞÉ«°É’s research-success also led to a paradigm shift in the International Rice Research Institute, which adopted ÑÇÖÞÉ«°É’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
Researchers
- Professor John Witcombe
- Dr Krishna Joshi
- Dr Daljit Virk