Nearly 100 million rice farmers live in unfavorable rice environments. These communities are among the poorest and most vulnerable to climate change. Solutions are urgently needed to avoid some of the worst impacts of climate change.

1. 2010 - 7
Policy Brief Series
ISSN 1656-8818
Nearly 100 million rice farmers live in
unfavorable rice environments. These
communities are among the poorest
and most vulnerable to climate change.
Solutions are urgently needed to avoid
some of the worst impacts of climate
change.
At a Consortium for Unfavorable Rice
Environments (CURE) workshop held
in Cambodia in May 2010, with the
theme: Responding to changing climate
in the unfavorable rice environments,
climate specialist Kay Sumfleth outlined
some of the expected impacts of climate
change. Climate modelers suggest that
year-to-year variability will increase and
extreme events will be more frequent.
There are great uncertainties over
regional differences and the expected
impacts of climate change on rice agro-
ecosystems. Amid these uncertainties,
however, farmers in unfavorable
areas are already facing many of the
constraints that are expected with
climate change. Solutions being
developed with farmers in “today’s”
unfavorable environments, therefore,
will serve rural people in other areas
likely to be affected in “tomorrow’s”
world.
International Rice Research Institute
(IRRI) Director General Robert
Zeigler stated that recent advances in
germplasm development have created
“entry points” to improved productivity
in the unfavorable areas. Likewise,
improving crop management could
greatly enhance the performance of
new tolerant rice varieties. Research
to address the constraints in the
unfavorable rice environments is now
providing real opportunities to reduce
rural poverty. Development and
diffusion of rice varieties and other
options that are acceptable to farmers
can have far-reaching impacts. The aim
is to increase production to “feed more
hungry mouths” and “reduce hunger
months” among poor families.
Climate change and the fragile rice
ecosystems
Extreme weather conditions will
make those in the less favorable rice
ecosystems more vulnerable to poverty.
Submergence affects nearly 20 million
hectares of rice in South and Southeast
Asia. Higher frequencies and intensities
of rains cause flooding in the deltas and
mega-deltas in the regions – the “rice
baskets of the world”. Drought
Developing “Climate-ready” rice to safeguard livelihoods
in the fragile ecosystems
Digna O. Manzanilla1
and David E. Johnson2

2. too has a tremendous impact on the
lives of millions of farmers. Tapan
Kumar Adhya, director of the Central
Rice Research Institute, stated that the
changing weather events will aggravate
the water scarcity in many parts of
India. In a related study in Jharkhand,
Orissa, and Chattisgarh, results have
shown that the ratio of loss to average
value of rice production during
drought years can reach 40 percent.
Approximately 23 million hectares of
rice area is drought-prone in South and
Southeast Asia.
Poverty within the upland farm
communities in Southeast Asia and in
the Himalayan region was described by
Sushil Pandey as being one of the most
challenging problems in the agricultural
sector. Land degradation, shifting
cultivation, water scarcity, and low
soil fertility are just some of the major
constraints. Improved rice germplasm
provides hope for increasing crop
productivity, particularly in 9 million
hectares of rice-based farming systems
in the upland of South and Southeast
Asia. Similarly, in the coastal rice areas,
increased frequency of storms and
rising sea water levels are aggravating
the problem on salinity. More than 27
million hectares are currently affected by
salinity in the coastal areas of South and
Southeast Asia.
CURE meets the challenges head on
Since 2002, CURE, managed by IRRI,
has been at the forefront of generating,
validating, and disseminating improved
germplasm and appropriate crop
and natural resource management
strategies. Funded by the International
Fund for Agricultural Development
(IFAD), CURE links National
Agricultural Research and Extension
Systems (NARES) and IRRI to deliver
technologies and management practices
for areas prone to submergence, salinity,
and drought, as well as the marginal
upland areas. CURE coordinator David
Johnson underscored the importance
of the network in helping to improve
the lives of the rural poor in rainfed
lowlands and uplands in South and
Southeast Asia. CURE works to
enhance capacities of the NARES and
other partners, and fosters the sharing
of knowledge across programs and
environments in the region. CURE aims
to significantly contribute to improving
food security and reducing poverty in
unfavorable rice environments in South and
Southeast Asia.
Addressing drought with appropriate
germplasm
Dave Mackill, program leader at IRRI,
explained the critical role that stress-tolerant
varieties can play for coping with the perils of
climate change. These stress-tolerant varieties
are important components of the adaptation
measures available now to benefit the poor.
Breeding for a new cultivar now takes only
2-3 years with marker-assisted backcrossing
(MAB) methods. Scientists have developed
drought-tolerant rice varieties, like Sahbhagi
dhan, a promising line that has undergone
national testing and has been well received.
Sahbhagi dhan gives a yield advantage of 0.5
– 1.0 t ha-1
, over two popular varieties and it
is now being widely distributed to farmers.
Other varieties that have been successfully
disseminated are Sahod Ulan 1 in the
Philippines, and Tarharra in Nepal.
Varieties for submergence-prone areas
The discovery of the SUB1 gene provides
new hope to the farmers in submergence-
Salinity affects more than 27 million hectares of coastal areas in South and Southeast Asia.

3. prone areas. SUB1, responsible for
tolerance during the vegetative stage,
was transferred to six “mega-varieties”
in Asia: IR64, TDK1, Swarna, Sambha
Mahsuri, BR11, and CR1009. In India
and Bangladesh, the acceptability to
farmers of Swarna has allowed the
tolerant version, Swarna-Sub1, to be
diffused as this adds protection for up to
two weeks of submergence. In Southeast
Asian countries like Thailand, Lao PDR,
Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam,
popular varieties grown in flood-prone
environments have been improved in
the same way. Development and seed
multiplication of TDK1-Sub1 for Lao
PDR, Ciherang-Sub1 for Indonesia, and
PSB Rc82-Sub1 in the Philippines are
examples expected to reduce farmers’
risks in submergence-prone areas.
Research on tolerance of salinity
The gene responsible for tolerance of
salinity at seedling stage, named Saltol,
is now being transferred to popular
varieties, and advances in tolerance
of other soil conditions is also in the
pipeline, especially for sodic soils.
More than 30 genotypes have been
evaluated in farmers’ fields in India. In
Bangladesh, BRRI dhan 47, a variety
that can yield 6.0 t ha-1
, was released
as a salinity-tolerant variety for the
boro (dry) season. Using such varieties,
cropping systems can be intensified by
using mildly saline water in canals for
irrigation.
Crop and natural resources
management (CNRM) for climate-
ready rice
Stephan Haefele and Abdelbagi Ismail
described suitable CNRM options
to reduce production costs and raise
productivity in rainfed environments.
Farmers can increase the benefit from
tolerant rice varieties by adjusting
management practices. However,
not all farmers have the appropriate
information or resources to implement
these. In drought-prone areas, for
instance, low-cost irrigation facilities
like the shallow tube wells in India,
Bangladesh, and the Philippines; and
rainwater harvesting in the Philippines,
northeast Thailand, Indonesia, and
eastern India, could be more widely
used. In other areas, adjusting the
cropping calendar, using shorter
duration rice cultivars, or dry direct
seeding for earlier crop establishment
can allow farmers to take advantage of
the residual moisture in the soil to grow
a second crop. Appropriate rice nursery
management can significantly increase
yield in areas affected by complete
submergence during the vegetative
stage. To Phuc Tuong and Zainul
Abedin, respectively, described options
of improved management approaches
being applied in salinity-stressed rice
areas in Vietnam and Bangladesh. These
options include suitable combinations
of rice-cropping systems, soil salinity
and nutrient management practices,
timing of crop establishment, and
improved drainage and flood control.
Because soil fertility is a key element to
increasing productivity in the marginal
upland areas, several crop combinations
using legumes have been tested

4. SOUTHEAST ASIAN REGIONAL CENTER
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IN AGRICULTURE
College, Laguna 4031, PHILIPPINES
Tel 63 49 5362290 | Fax 63 49 5367097
www.searca.org | post@agri.searca.org
including peanut, soybean, cowpea, and
also maize as an intercrop with upland
rice. Weeds have been addressed using
methods such as combining variable
seed rate in northeast India, integrated
chemical control and hand weeding in
Nepal, and integrated herbicide control
of weed problems and crop rotation of
pigeon pea with rice in Lao PDR and
Vietnam.
Moving forward for greater impacts
While substantial advances have
been made in creating options for
unfavorable areas, much work remains
to be done to reach the large numbers
of poor farmers who could benefit
from CURE outputs. Research is
underway for the identification and
development of tolerance of additional
stresses, and combining tolerances
with popular varieties to address both
salinity and submergence in coastal
areas. Recognizing the complexity of
conditions in the fields, breeders are
developing multiple-stress-tolerant
rice varieties. Gene discovery for other
traits is ongoing, yet not only tolerant
varieties are being developed, but
appropriate crop and natural resource
management options are also in the
“pipeline”.
Farmers are often the best judges as
to which technology options will give
them greatest benefit. This, however,
requires adequate information to enable
the farmers to make informed decisions.
Sharing information among NARES
so that research and extension staff
members have greater resources available
to them is a priority within CURE. The
complex landscapes make development
in fragile rice environments extremely
challenging, but, as these areas are home
to resource-poor rice farmers, the efforts
to raise their productivity are urgent.
Cause for optimism, however, is the
progress currently being made in the
CURE partnerships.
For more information, visit:
CURE website www.irri.org/•
CURE/CURE.htm
CURE face book account www.•
facebook.com/CURE.IRRI
Main sources of information: Papers•
presented at the 9th CURE Steering
Committee Meeting and Mini-
Symposium on Climate Change
and Rice, May 3-5, 2010, Siem
Reap, Cambodia.
1
Associate CURE Coordinator and
Scientist (Social Sciences), IRRI
2
CURE Coordinator and Senior Scientist
(Weed Science), IRRI