IRRI - International Rice Research Institute

Hybrids in the Philippines to boost rice production and generate rural employment

Over the next 25 years, feeding the expanding Philippine population will require at least 65% more rice than is grown today. Recognizing the potential of rice hybrids to improve production and farmers' incomes, the Philippine government launched a hybrid rice program in 1998 under the Department of Agriculture.

The Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) took the lead nationwide in research and development, seed production, training, technology demonstration, and information dissemination. The PhilRice hybrid rice research program, in which more than 80 researchers conduct 18 multidisciplinary projects, was bolstered by the establishment of a hybrid rice center and by collaboration with IRRI, the private sector and Chinese hybrid-rice R&D institutions.

Season-long training activities for prospective hybrid-seed growers in strategic areas led to the organization of cooperatives that began producing hybrid seed on a commercial scale in 2000. Hybrid-seed production is a labor-intensive process requiring about 50-75 person days ha-1 of labor beyond what is needed to grow grain. The additional labor requirement is for extra farm operations such as thin [PF1]and row planting, supplementary pollination, gap filling and rouging.

The more than 1,000 trainers, agricultural technicians, seed inspectors, and local government officers that were trained on hybrid-rice cultivation techniques extended this new knowledge to hybrid-rice cultivators. On large-scale technology demonstration farms, the IRRI-developed hybrid rice Mestizo showed more than a 1.2 t ha-1 yield advantage over the best inbred varieties during 1997-1999. In commercial cultivation areas, it gave 1.3 t ha-1 yield advantage over the inbred varieties during the 2001 wet season and 2.0 t ha-1 advantage in the 2002 dry season.

This technology has provided a niche for an emerging hybrid rice seed industry in the country, manifested by the increasing private-sector participation in breeding, seed production and technology promotion.
In addition to being a key approach for increasing rice productivity and profitability in the Philippines, hybrid-rice technology is also a major means of creating new jobs in the rice sector. Thus, the Office of the President of the Republic of the Philippines launched the Hybrid Rice Commercialization Program as a flagship program. In this program the government is targeting that 135,000 ha be planted to hybrid rice in 2002, 200,000 ha in 2003, and 300,000 ha in 2004.

"...that whoever could make...two blades of grass to grow on a spot of ground where one grew before would deserve better of mankind and do more essential service to his country..."-Jonathan Swift

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