Bill Gates to help Orissa farmers

Tathya.in, July 25, 2009
New Delhi:25/July/2009

Arabinda Padhee is an innovative mandarin.

So the Director Agriculture and Food Production of Orissa, is always busy for looking better opportunities for the farming communities.

With the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), showing interest to support the Orissa farmers, Dr.Padhee rushed to grab an opportunity for the same.

BMGF, which is the largest transparently operated private foundation in the World, is going to fund further in agricultural research in South Asia in general and Orissa in particular.

This unique support is going to help the poor rice growing farmers of India.

The Foundation is at present promoting various health related activities in India, particularly in the field of AIDS and Polio.
However, grants for development of stress tolerant rice varieties for poor farmers in Asia and Africa have now, brought lot of goodwill for the BMGF.

This was revealed in a recent meeting taken by Bill Gates himself here on Thursday.

He is in India to receive the Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development on behalf of the BMGF.

The Gates Foundation funded STRASA (Stress Tolerant Rice for Poor Farmers in Africa and South Asia ) project of IRRI (International Rice Research Institute) has now come up with rice varieties those are suitable for problematic conditions and soils.

Orissa was the first State in India to release Swarna Sub-1, a variety having tolerance to flash flooding for about 2 weeks.

This variety, having the same yield potential like popular Swarna variety of Orissa, can withstand water submergence for about 10-12 days.

Trials conducted by Central Rice Research Institute (CRRI), Cuttack and the OUAT have shown promising results.

And we are going to multiply the seeds material this season, so that it could find large scale adoption by farmers in coming years, said Dr. Padhee, Director, Agriculture and Food Production.

Varieties tolerant to drought conditions, which are in advanced stage of research could equally be very useful for rain fed rice farmers of Orissa, said Dr. Padhee.

He further said that saline tolerant varieties of rice would also be popularized in coastal districts of the State having such problematic soils.

The CRRI and the State Agriculture University are going to help the Agriculture Department for this unique initiative.

Dr. Padhee along with the Deputy Director General of ICAR and the Director, CRRI was invited to meet Bill Gates here.

Senior Scientists of IRRI, based in the Philippines , Dr. David Mackill and Dr. U.S. Singh also joined the discussions.

The STRASA project is expected to have a positive impact on the poor farmers of Eastern India, said sources.