Rice
The BOLD Rice Project
The BOLD rice project in Vietnam is using participatory plant breeding and evaluation approaches to develop new crop wild relative-derived rice varieties that have the agronomic characteristics required by farmers and quality characteristics demanded by consumers. This will contribute to enhanced food security and livelihoods of farm families across the country.
Why rice?
Together with maize and wheat, rice (Oryza sativa L.). supplies more than 42% of the calories of the human diet globally. Rice is a staple food for about half of the world’s population. Rice is grown on more than 7 million hectares across the whole of Vietnam and is the main food of the country’s people. It is grown commercially in more than 100 countries on all continents except Antarctica, although the great majority of production and consumption is in Asia. It is grown in both tropical and temperate regions, in both rainfed and irrigated systems.
Challenges
Major challenges facing rice production in Vietnam include drought, salinity, flooding and damage by pests and diseases. These challenges are increasing with climate change. However, rice varieties released from both the formal and informal seed sectors are generally not tolerant of or resistant to these challenges.
Building on the Crop Wild Relatives Project
The Crop Wild Relatives Project made a large number of crosses between rice wild relatives and cultivated landraces of Asian rice. In preliminary studies, more than 100 lines were identified with tolerance to drought, acid sulfate soils and saline conditions and resistance to blast disease and brown plant hopper damage. The BOLD rice project in Vietnam will use these lines in participatory plant breeding and evaluation work to develop and release new climate-resilient varieties with key agronomic characteristics required by farmers and quality characteristics demanded by consumers.
Project partners
In the Mekong Delta (South) Vietnam
- Vietnam Mekong Delta Development Research Institute, Can Tho University, Vietnam (lead)
- Agricultural extension centers of provinces in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam
- Agricultural seed centers of provinces in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam
- Department of Crop Production and Plant Protection of provinces in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam
- College of Agriculture, Can Tho University, Vietnam
- Department of Crop Production, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
- South Center for Variety Evaluation and Seed Certification, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
- Southern Region Plant Protection Center, Tien Giang, Vietnam
In Central Vietnam
- Agricultural extension centers of Phu Yen province, Vietnam
- Agricultural research centers of Gia Lai provinces, Vietnam
In North Vietnam
- Plant Resources Center, Hanoi, Vietnam
- Northern Mountainous Agriculture & Forestry Science Institute, Phu Tho province, Vietnam
- Faculty of Agriculture - Forestry - Aquaculture, Hung Vuong University, Phu Tho province, Vietnam
- Agricultural Extension Center, Yen Bai province, Vietnam
- Agricultural Extension Center, Lao Cai province, Viet Nam
Project Seed club partners
In the Mekong Delta (South) Vietnam
- Tan Hoi Dong Seed club: Tan Hoi Dong Village, Chau Thanh district, Tien Giang province
- Dinh An Seed club: Dinh An Village, Lap Vo district, Dong Thap province
- Nui Voi Seed club: Nui Voi village, Tinh Bien district, An Giang province
- Tan Binh Seed club: Tan Binh village, Long My town, Hau Giang province
- Nong Phat Seed club: Lang Tron village, Gia Rai town, Bac Lieu province
In Central Vietnam
- An Ninh Tay Seed club: An Ninh Tay village, Phu An district, Phu Yen province
- An Phu Seed club: An Phu village, Pleiku City, Gia Lai province
In North Vietnam
- Tam Son 1 Seed club: Son Hung village, Thanh Son district, Phu Tho province
- Noong Tai Seed club, Thuong Bang La village, Van Chan district, Yen Bai province
- Vi Kem Seed club, Coc My village, Bat Xat district, Lao Cai province
Activities
- Evaluate CWR-derived rice pre-breeding lines in preliminary yield trials across locations to study adaptation and performance
- Conduct participatory evaluations of CWR-derived pre-breeding lines with farmers, including adaptation and advanced yield trials
- Register and release promising lines for wide-scale testing and use
- Conserve promising CWR-derived pre-breeding lines, varieties and promising germplasm with specific traits in national, regional and international genebanks
- Characterize key materials in rice genebanks for tolerance of drought, salinity and acid sulfate soils and resistance to pests and diseases and for nutritional quality traits
- Develop new pre-breeding populations with required characteristics and make them available to partner genebanks and plant breeders
- Strengthen the capacity and knowledge for partner farmers and local institutions on participatory rice breeding, evaluation, characterization and use of genebank materials, and data documentation
- Make all data generated available online.
Rice resources
Crop Trust stories
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More than Rice: An Inside Look at the Vietnam National Genebank, 14 March 2023
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Early Flowering African Rice Beats the Heat. 5 July 2022.
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Farmers know best: Developing salt-tolerant rice in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. 23 June 2021.
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A little wild in our rice. 8 January 2020.
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Find them if you can: Searching for wild relatives in Central America.
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In Vietnam: Farmers evaluate wild rice-derived lines. 31 July 2019.
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Sunset of a population. 6 April 2018.
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Tigers, elephants and wild rice. 4 December 2017.
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Resilient Rice. 10 October 2013.
Relevant publications
- Arbelaez, J.D., Moreno, L.T., Singh, N., Tung, C-W., Maron, L.G., Ospina, Y., Martinez, C.P., Grenier, C., Lorieux, M., McCouch, S. 2015. Development and GBS−genotyping of introgression lines (ILs) using two wild species of rice, O. meridionalis and O. rufipogon, in a common recurrent parent, O. sativa cv. Curinga. Molecular Breeding 35(2): 81. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11032-015-0276-7
- Kim, H., Jung, J., Singh, N., Greenberg, A., Doyle, J.J., Tyagi, W., Chung, J-W., Kimball, J., Sackville Hamilton, R., McCouch, S.R. 2016. Population dynamics among six major groups of the Oryza rufipogon species complex, wild relative of cultivated Asian rice. Rice 9: 56. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12284-016-0119-0.
- Boateng, S.K., Aboagye, L.M., Egbadzor, K.F., Darko, R.K., Ameka, G.K., Ekpe, P., Kanton, R., Dogbe, W., Saaka-Buah, S. 2019. Collecting of crop wild relatives and minor crops in Ghana. Research in Agricultural & Veterinary Sciences 3(2): 89–95.
- Medeiros, M.B., Valls, J.F.M., Abreu, A.G., Heiden, G., Ribeiro-Silva, S., José, S.C.B.R., Santos, I.R.I, Passos, A.M.A., Burle, M.L. 2021. Status of the ex situ and in situ conservation of Brazilian crop wild relatives of rice, potato, sweet potato, and finger millet: Filling the gaps of germplasm collections. Agronomy 21: 638. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11040638.
- Tin, H.Q., Loi, N.H., Bjornstad, Å., Kilian, B. 2021. Participatory selection of CWR-derived salt-tolerant rice lines adapted to the coastal zone of the Mekong Delta. Crop Science: 61: 277–288.
- Tin, H.Q., Loi, N.H., Labarosa, S.J.E., McNally,K.L., McCouch, S., Kilian, B. 2021. Phenotypic response of farmer−selected CWR−derived rice lines to salt stress in the Mekong Delta. Crop Science: 61: 201–208.