Pakistan Agriculture Research Council introduces aerobic rice production technology

Pakistan Agriculture Research Council (PARC) has introduced a new technology called Aerobic Rice Production Technology, aiming at conserve water and enhance paddy yield. Chairman PARC Dr.Zafar Altaf told APP that under the technology the paddy crops do not need standing water necessary for the crop but cultivated like wheat and maize crops. He claimed that by using the technology the farmers in the country can enhance their production from existing 26 Maund to 73 Maund which is more than double of the yield. “Through this method we can conserve 30 percent of water in the rice cultivating areas”, he remarked. Initially, he said that PARC has selected one district in Sind (Sangar and Sakrand) and one in Punjab (Bahawalpur, Rahimyar Khan and Multan). He said that in Pakistan, rice is, traditionally, grown as manual transplanting of 30-days old rice seedlings in the well flooded and puddled fields. Rice nursery is raised separately on fine-prepared and manured soil. He added that the nursery seedlings at the age of 30-35 days are, then, uprooted manually and shifted to the flooded and puddle field. Puddling, he said land preparation in flooding destroys soil structure and after paddy crop harvest, the soil condition is not conducive for fine land preparation and good stand establishment of following Rabi crops. He added that farmers keep standing of water continuously up to the maturity of rice crop. Moreover, manual and random transplanting of rice seedlings does ensure optimum plant population. About 50,000-60,000 plants are found in the manual transplanted crop against the recommended plant population of 80,000 to 100,000 per acre. In this respect, he said that the conventional method of rice cultivation is labour and water-intensive and involves high cost of energy, with the result of low paddy yield. Hence, he observed the present rice cultivation system is not very productive, resource-efficient and sustainable, and poses serious threats to the sustainability of rice-based cropping system. Alternatively, he said aerobic rice (a special rice that is grown like wheat or maize crops) addresses to such issues and saves water, labour, time and improves stand establishment of the following crops.