ANI, China partner to start producing hybrid rice

Beidahuang Philippines, a joint venture between listed agribusiness firm AgriNurture Inc. (ANI) and Beidahuang Seed Group of China, will produce hybrid rice in the Philippines to serve growing demand for food.

ANI CEO and president Antonio Tiu said in an interview that the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) had approved the commercial production of Mestizo 30, the hybrid rice variety developed by Beidahuang.

Beidahuang Philippines is initially propagating Mestizo 30 on 2,000 hectares of partner-farms with an investment of about P100 million.

The company aims to have a total of 10,000 hectares planted in several cycles by end-2012, Tiu said.

The joint venture company, established in late 2010, is focused on developing hybrid rice seed varieties, selling these to farmers and buying the farmers’ produce for sale all over the Philippines.

Data from the Department of Agriculture show that domestic palay demand was expected to reach 20.6 million tons to 20.7 million tons by the end of 2011; 20.9 million tons by 2012; and 21.11 million tons by 2013.

The government’s palay output target is placed at 17.4 million tons in 2011, 19.2 million tons in 2012, and 21.12 million tons by 2013 to achieve sufficiency in rice supply.

Hybrid rice propagation is seen as one of the keys to achieving rice sufficiency because hybrids yield more than the regular inbred varieties.

Rice breeding, or the science that brings new rice varieties to farmers, resulted in an average gain of $52 per hectare yearly for Filipino farmers over 24 years (between 1985 and 2009), according to an Australian study on the impact of rice research in the Philippines.—Riza T. Olchondra