ACIAR’s hunger for rice growth

An Australian-backed new agricultural research project is expected to fuel Vietnam’s southern rice granary.

The A$4 million project funded through the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) was kicked-off last week and would run until 2014.

The research is a partnership between the International Rice Research Institute, Vietnamese and Australian research centres, local authorities and farmers.

“The project aims to improve the adaptive capacity of rice production systems in the Mekong Delta region. This is done by providing farmers and management agencies with new technologies and practices that will provide resilience in the rice cropping system under the likely climatic changes faced from climate change,” said an Australian embassy statement.

The project is expected to ameliorate rice germplasm for higher tolerance to stagnant flooding, salinity stress and anaerobic conditions during germination. It is also expected to invent land use alternatives to sole rice systems that may either replace or be implemented in rotation with the rice crop for better income.

The project can provide decision tools for farmers and key institutions, give soil management guidelines for nutrient cycling and inundation of acid sulphate soils. It will also evaluate the extent of adaptive capacity and other benefits likely to result from a range of climate change adaptation options.

The project can also make response strategies through land use planning for the predicted salinity and flooding changes, and provide technologies and knowledge to improve food security in the Mekong Delta.

“We anticipate this project to provide farmers with a set of new tools to help them modify their farming systems and have a greater selection of rice varieties and information to choose the right crop for the right year and minimise the risk of low yield and thus low income,” said Le Quang Tri, director of Research Institute for Climate Change and Vietnamese project leader.

Australian consul general Graeme Swift said that the Australian government was committed to supporting developing countries to mitigate and adapt to climate change. This was a high priority for the Australian government and was one of the five priority areas of the Australia-Vietnam Development Co-operation Strategy, he said.

“We understand how important the Mekong is to rice production not only in Vietnam but for the region, so this project is just one part of the Australian government’s efforts to support global food security,” Swift said.

ACIAR has funded over 110 collaborative research projects in Vietnam since 1993 across different sectors in agriculture, forestry, fisheries and agricultural policy.

There are 14 active projects under the ACIAR Vietnam programme now, focusing mostly in the Mekong Delta, south central coast and northwestern highlands, with current disbursement of about A$3.5 million per year.