NCRI, AfricaRice release Two Flood Tolerant Rice Varieties `Farrow 66’ and `Farrow 67’, to Boost Rice Production

NCRI, AfricaRice release Two Flood Tolerant Rice Varieties `Farrow 66’ and `Farrow 67’, to Boost Rice Production

The National Cereals Research Institute (NCRI) and Africa Rice Centre (AfricaRice) have, under the Bill Melinda Gates rice project, released two rice varieties that could withstand flood and increase rice yields in Nigeria.
Dr Mohammed Bashir, the National Coordinator for STRASA and Green Super Rice (GSR III) Projects, said this at the workshop on Rice Varietal Replacement Strategies in Abuja on Monday.
Bashir said that the new varieties would help rice farmers to increase their yields from two tonnes per hectare to about seven tonnes per hectare.
He said that the move was to enable Nigeria to achieve self-sufficiency in rice production.
“Rice is a staple food which every household in Nigeria consumes but our production is very low; the local varieties produced by farmers are low-yielding and we have some biotic and abiotic challenges that limit the production of our variety.
“We usually produce about two to three tonnes, using the farmers’ varieties and with good intervention of technologies, we now have improved varieties that can yield up to four to seven metric tonnes under good management.
“I recall that in 2012, we experienced floods and most rice farms across the country were washed out.
“AfricaRice and National Cereals Research Institute, Badeggi, under these STRASA and GSR projects, were able to release two prominent flood-tolerant rice varieties called `Farrow 66’ and `Farrow 67’,’’ .
Dr Francis Nwilene, the Regional Representative of AfricaRice in Nigeria, said "We have released these rice varieties for Nigerian farmers and now; these seeds are being moved by the seeds companies that are producing them to farmers for planting, and this is the essence of the project.
“This project is about smallholder farmers; whatever we are developing is for them to plant in their farms,’’

Source
Voice of Nigeria