The Food Chain Should we eat less rice?
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Jan 16, 2025 Jacob Klein, anthropologist at SOAS who studies food policy and cultural diets; Jean-Philippe Laborde, managing director at Tilda running sustainability field trials; Yvonne Pinto, head of IRRI breeding resilient rice. They discuss rice’s climate vulnerabilities and methane problem. They cover breeding resilient varieties, alternate wetting and drying trials, and attempts to shift diets toward potatoes in China and Bangladesh.
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Rice Feeds Half The World And Carries Deep Cultural Meaning
- Rice is the principal staple for roughly 4 billion people and its consumption is still rising in regions like Africa.
- Yvonne Pinto notes rice's deep cultural significance, citing Vietnam where people ask each other if they've eaten rice today.
Breeding Rice To Withstand Heat Drought And Floods
- The world will likely need more rice even as climate change creates droughts, floods and extreme heat challenges.
- IRRI mines its 132,000‑accession gene bank to breed drought and heat tolerant varieties, stored also in Svalbard.
Flooded Paddies Are A Major Source Of Methane
- Flooded rice paddies create anaerobic conditions where microorganisms produce substantial methane emissions.
- IRRI estimates rice production accounts for about 10% of agriculture's global greenhouse gas emissions.