China's new rice varieties up 40% yields

(ECNS) -- China’s new rice varieties, “157” and “X56”, recorded a yield of 717.56 kilograms per mu (10,613.4 kilograms per hectare) and 702.5 kilograms per mu (10,537.5 kilograms per hectare) respectively in Xing’an League, north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on Monday.

The rice varieties were developed by the team of late agronomist Yuan Longping, China's hybrid rice pioneer at the workstation.

The two new varieties yield 40 percent higher than the high-quality rice on the market, which yields about 500 kilograms per mu (7,500 kilograms per hectare) on average. It is a hard-won achievement, said Wang Shigang, head of the workstation.

The two varieties should pass final assessments in one to two years of production experiment before mass planting and production, an expert said.

Thanks to the new rice variety, Yuan's visions are turning into a reality. He hoped to achieve the goal of increasing rice production by 1,500 kilograms per hectare in Xing'an League within 3 years, and cultivating good rice seeds with real unique advantages for Inner Mongolia, when the workstation was established here in 2018.

A panel of seven rice experts conducted the test, all from top rice research institutions, including the China National Rice Research Institute, the Northern Rice Research Center of the China Rice Research Institute, the Institute of Crop Science of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and the Hunan Agricultural University.