1st Joint Call: 'Climate-Resilient Rice' in Thailand and Laos
The project:
Rice is a staple food for more than half of the world’s population, and one of the major crops for both consumption and as a commodity in Southeast Asia. However, it is also vulnerable to the effects of climate change, and increased temperatures worldwide are predicted to cause reduced crop yields in the future.
To counteract this, the Climate-ResilientRice project (CRR) aims to strengthen rice breeding programs in Thailand and Laos, so that crops will be able to withstand the effects of climate change, and even enhance production under adverse conditions.
CRR has been funded through the 1st Call of the Southeast Asia-Europe Joint Funding Scheme for for Research and Innovation (JFS) and brings together a team from both regions to tackle this pressing issue.
The Science:
The project will use a varietal improvement process based on the most advanced knowledge of traits which are affected by climate change, such as high temperatures (that cause yield losses due to rice flowers’ sterility), and use proven methods of marker-assisted selection on a state of the art breeding data-management system.
It will also make use of complementary experimental facilities, including field and greenhouse phenotyping facilities in NAFRI/BIOTEC, respectively, growth chamber facility mimicking high temperature at CIRAD, and molecular marker lab at BIOTEC.
The Team:
The CRR project partners are:
- Rice Gene Discovery Unit, BIOTEC, NSTDA, Pathumthani, Thailand; http://www.biotec.or.th/en (Project Coordinator)
- Agriculture Research Center (ARC),National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute (NAFRI), Vientianne, Laos ; www.nafri.org.la
- French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD), Montpellier, France; https://www.cirad.fr
Contact:
Jonaliza L. Siangliw: jonaliza.sia@biotec.or.th