Upon hearing about a new rice variety that can be harvested for many years without replanting, Liang Yuxin, a farmer from Guangxi (China), was eager to experiment with it.
Liang is one of over 40,000 small-scale farmers in China who decided to cultivate this new rice variety. He shared with the South China Morning Post (Hong Kong, China) that if he successfully tests it, it will motivate many other farmers in the local area.
Liang Yuxin’s perennial rice field. (Photo: SCMP).
Farmer Liang Yuxin commented: “There are many abandoned plots of land in the rural areas of Southern China, and the cost of replanting is high. However, if I can plant rice once and harvest it for many years, the costs will be significantly reduced.”
Researchers at Yunnan University have spent over two decades developing this rice variety. They crossed a domesticated annual Asian rice variety with a wild perennial rice variety from Africa to create a strain known as Perennial Rice 23 (PR23).
According to research published in the journal Nature Sustainability, PR23 not only shows potential in yield but is also believed to help reduce cultivation costs and improve soil quality. Professor Erik Sacks from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, a co-author of the study, stated that less frequent tilling has protected the soil and built up organic matter. Additionally, growing perennial rice also helps save water.
In its first four years, the yield of PR23 averaged 6.8 tons per hectare per season, slightly higher than the 6.7 tons per hectare per season achieved by traditional annual rice varieties.
This rice variety allows farmers to save up to $1,400 for each harvest.
The perennial rice does not require sowing, cultivation, or tilling for several years, which means farmers can save up to $1,400 for each subsequent harvest. This perennial rice can help reduce labor costs by up to 60%.
PR23 is among the 29 rice varieties recommended by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China to farmers since the beginning of this year. Farmers have had access to this rice variety for commercial planting since 2018. In 2021, the total area planted with perennial rice in China was 15,000 hectares.
Mr. Liang planted another perennial rice variety, PR25, on 1 hectare of land in August this year and harvested over 8 tons of rice after 3 months.
