Alastair McIndoe, Philippines Correspondent Straits Times 25 Dec 09;
LOS BANOS: Near a patchwork of emerald-green rice fields, a research facility is being built here to house the experimental plants that crop scientists hope will produce a revolutionary high-yielding rice strain.
If successful, the project led by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) will ensure that future global demand for the food staple can be comfortably met.
'This is an Apollo project - long range, high risk, but with an extremely high pay-off,' IRRI director-general Robert Zeigler told The Straits Times.
After the spikes in world food prices in 2007 and last year, 'now is the right time to start this bold challenge', he added.
Leading plant scientists from Asia, Europe and the United States are collaborating on the 'C4 Project' to alter the intricate biochemisty of rice plants so that they capture sunlight - a process called photosynthesis - more efficiently.
The programme, already under way, is in uncharted scientific territory.
Newly-appointed project leader William Quick, a professor of plant physiology and photosynthesis specialist from Britain's University of Sheffield, thinks it will be between 15 and 25 years before C4 rice is ready for farmers' fields.
Funding to get the project off the ground came from an US$11.5 million (S$16.2 million) grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. An early breakthrough would probably see more funds being ploughed in from other sources.
The goal is to genetically modify rice into a C4 photosynthesis plant, like maize, sorghum and sugar cane, which absorb sunlight faster and more efficiently than C3 plants, which include rice.
Dr Quick said: 'To make the conversion to C4 photosynthesis, we have to change the biochemistry and anatomy of the leaf, and we don't yet understand the mechanism for doing this. But we're just at the start.'
The IRRI - which initiated the first green revolution of high-yield rice and is marking its 50th anniversary - believes C4 rice could boost yields by 50 per cent.
As Dr Zeigler put it: 'If the project is successful, we won't have to worry about rice supplies.'
And Dr Quick added: 'It would be like a second green revolution.'
Meanwhile, there are renewed supply concerns after last year's rice crisis, when prices surged to record highs and countries scrambled to stock up.
Typhoons in the Philippines, severe monsoons in India, and insect damage to crops in Thailand, a major rice exporter, have again put upward pressure on prices - and again focused international attention on the challenge of ensuring global food security for rice.
According to the IRRI, production will have to rise around 2 per cent a year to keep pace with consumption, but not even half that is being achieved.
While there is hope that new land for planting rice may open up in Brazil and Argentina, land in Asia's traditional rice-growing countries is being squeezed by urbanisation and pressured by the impact of climate change. This means higher-yielding and more resilient rice will need to be developed.
But Dr Zeigler said: 'There is a reasonable certainty that we can build rice plants that produce well in the difficult environments we'll be facing.'
He noted that research is progressing into developing rice with high tolerance to flooding, drought and salinity in soil.
'So if farmers manage crops better, improve post-harvest handling - by not drying rice on roads, for example - and use the technologies that we know are good, then I think over the next 20 years demand can be met,' he said.
The research rainbow does not end with developing C4 rice, however.
'The next frontier would be a really smart rice plant that would not need a lot of fertiliser. It could detect the nitrogen content in soil and balance out its own needs by capturing additional nitrogen from the air,' said Dr Zeigler.
'Basically, it would have its own genetic control system to fine-tune how it interacts with the environment.'
Another possibility is creating a rice strain that requires less cooking or, in other words, rice that would be nearly edible at harvest.
'We're talking about some very funky plants,' said Dr Zeigler.