China's rice technology nourishing Africa's needs

In China's vast rice breeding community, Hu Fengyi is in the minority.Over the past two decades, the plant scientist at Yunnan University has maintained a sharp focus on mining the potential of a perennial rice variety originally from Africa, which can be harvested multiple times and reduces labor costs.Unlike hybrid rice and other conventional high-yield varieties, perennial rice has received limited academic attention in the past."There are lots of researchers studying rice in China, and if your research is mainstream you are able to compare notes with your fellow researchers," he said.However, perennial rice is such a little-researched field that it is impossible to work with others to fast-track progress. "You have to feel the way forward in the darkness," Hu said.Through trial and error, Hu and his colleagues have combined the perennial variety with mainstream ones, and rolled out three hybrid varieties that can transcend rice's normal life cycle, and when grown in the right ...