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Climate change could hamper rice production
11/Oct/2006: Dr. M.S.Swaminathan, a renowned Indian agricultural scientist and the head of the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, fears that climate change triggered by global warming could hold back the rice production and productivity, substantially.
While speaking on ‘Science and Shaping the Future of Rice’, at the second International Rice Congress in New Delhi, Dr. Swaminathan said that the Asian rice production could fall by an average of 4% due to climate change.
Dr. Swaminathan added that changes in the rainfall pattern could induce severe floods or droughts, which might badly affect the rice production. According to him, increase in global temperatures and changes in precipitation, favors diseases and insects that attacks the rice crop and higher carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere could alter the competition between rice and other major weeds. Global warming could also affect other organisms that are responsible for nitrogen fixation in the rice fields.
Dr. Swaminathan feels that increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels might prove beneficial to the rice crops, but this advantage would be negated by the increasing global temperatures. Dr. Swaminathan is known as the ‘Father of Indian Green Revolution’ for his commendable contributions to the ‘Green Revolution’ movement in India. According to him, evergreen revolution means enhancing the productivity continually, without causing any harm to the ecology.
57% of the Indian farmers grow rice, which meets one-third of the caloric needs of this country. The director general of the Indian Council for Agricultural Research, while addressing the International Rice Congress, said that the decline in soil health and water quality, in rice-based agriculture systems is a global issue and global warming could worsen this situation, since it affects the soil fertility and the yield.
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