Seawater rice fields offer ample harvest
New variety（新品种） said to have potential for providing food to hundreds of millions
The country's first seawater rice fields（海水稻田） in Qingdao, Shandong province, were harvested on Thursday.
Of the four types of seawater rice harvested, the one with the highest yield（高产） reached 9.3 metric tons per hectare, much higher than expected（远超预期）, experts said.
The other three types yielded 8.2 tons, 7.4 tons and 6.6 tons per hectare, according to a report by a group of agricultural experts who measured the harvest.
"The planting of rice in seawater has seen its first success, and the planting area（种植面积） will be expanded next year," said Yuan Longping－who has been dubbed "the father of hybrid rice"（被称为“杂交水稻之父”）. Yuan led the research.（由……牵头）
The rice was grown in two fields that were planted in April.
Seawater rice, or salt-alkali-tolerant rice（又称耐盐碱水稻）, is designed to grow in tidal flats（滩涂） and saline-alkaline land（盐碱地） and can survive after being immersed in seawater（在海水中也能存活）.
Yuan and his team set up a research center in Qingdao to develop seawater rice（开发海水稻） last year.
He said the seawater rice is vital to China's food security（对粮食安全至关重要）. The world has 950 million hectares of land that is saline and alkaline（盐碱地面积达9.5亿公顷）, with Asia accounting for about one-third of the total（亚洲占三分之一）. China has 100 million hectares of saline-alkaline soil.
Growing rice is the first choice to improve the quality of such soil（改善这种土质的第一选择就是种植水稻）, Yuan said.
"If 50 percent of the world's rice paddies grew hybrids, rice production would increase by another 150 million tons, and 400 to 500 million more people could be fed（如果全球一半的稻田种植杂交水稻，水稻产量将会再增加1.5亿吨，可以多养活4到5亿人）," Yuan said.
Yuan's team plans to develop a type of seawater rice that can be planted in 6.67 million hectares of saline-alkaline land around China, which they estimate could boost the country's rice harvest by about 20 percent.（使中国的水稻产量增加20%）
"Sea rice grown on saline-alkaline land has more mineral content than ordinary rice because seawater contains high levels of microelements," said Yang Hongyan, who works at Qingdao's seawater rice research and development center.（微量元素）
"In addition, sea rice grows in a wild environment, is not contaminated by heavy metals and isn't subject to plant diseases or insect pests," （海水稻在野外环境中生长，没有重金属污染，也不受病虫害影响）Yang said.[/cp]
网友评论