Comment by FlyingSnake
12 hours ago
Honestly the rice varieties in India should be promoted and protected more. The diversity and health benefits of these varieties is immense.
12 hours ago
Honestly the rice varieties in India should be promoted and protected more. The diversity and health benefits of these varieties is immense.
This is so important. Kerala in particular had a treasure trove of varieties, some well suited to low rainfall, resistant to local pests. I am sure other states had/has such diversity too, I am just not knowledgeable enough.
These genotypes are being lost to industrial mono-cropping. The government is doing nothing about it.
There is hope. India's Central Rice Research Institute is quite active and is working on some of the problems.
https://icar-crri.in/popular-nrri-varieties/
> These genotypes are being lost to industrial mono-cropping. The government is doing nothing about it.
This is happening worldwide and is one of the tragedies of modernity. Mexico for instance has tons of regional varieties of peppers that don't grow anywhere else except for in a very specific micro climate and they're disappearing in large part because of cheap imports that makes farming them unprofitable.
So unfortunate. Short term thinking doing its damage.