On the morning of September 11th, Dr. Khush and Researcher Tang Shengxiang participated in the 37th High-end Crops Forum organized by the College of Plant Sciences & Technology(PST). At the lecture hall 129, Genetic Building, Dr. Khush and Researcher Tang delivered academic reports on “The History of Green Revolution and Prospects of Next Green Revolution of Rice Science” and “Analysis of Core Backbone Germplasm of Rice in China” respectively. Doctor Gurdev S. Khush is a visiting professor from the University of California at Davis and chief nursery scholar at the International Rice Research Institute, foreign academician of the American Academy of Sciences, member of the Royal Society, foreign academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, academician of the World Academy of Sciences, academician of the Indian Academy of Sciences, and academician of the Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences. And Researcher Tang Shengxiang is the Former director of Genetic Resources Department of China Rice Research Institute. Professor Zhang Qifa, an academician of the Chinese academy of sciences, with more than 200 teachers and students from the college of PST and College of Life Sciences & Technology attended the symposium. Professor Peng Shaobing, a distinguished expert of the national "thousand talents program" and scholar of the “Yangtze river program” presided over the meeting.
At first, Dr. Khush introduced the importance of rice as a food crop and illustrated that the green revolution had improved the utilization rate of rice nitrogen fertilizer, rice resistance, rice nutrition quality and shortened rice growth period, based on breeding of several IR series rice varieties and related data. By 2030, global rice production must rise by 38% from its current level to meet human demand for food. Dr. Khush thought it was a great challenge and put forward his proposals: developing C4 rice and further increasing rice resistance to disease.
Then, researcher Tang Shengxiang made a report. Starting from the history of rice, he introduced China's abundant and diverse rice genetic resources, and believed that the backbone parent in rice genetic resources contributed greatly to the genetic improvement of rice varieties. Based on backbone parent, he introduced the process of rice breeding in China: short rod in the 1950s, three-line hybrid rice in the 1970s and 1980s, photoperiod-thermo sensitive genic sterile rice line in the 1980s, utilization of the germplasm in 1990s and green super rice now. Every progress brought a qualitative leap for rice production.
Finally, Dr. Khush and Researcher Tang discussed with teachers and students present on many topics, such as modern intelligent agriculture, green super rice and genetic gain of rice in China, etc.
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Gurdev S. Khush：visiting professor at the University of California, Davis; former chief breeder of the International Rice Research Institute (Philippines); director of the Department of Genetics, Breeding and Biochemistry; received a bachelor's degree in agriculture from Punjab Agricultural University in India in 1955 and a doctorate degree in Genetics from the University of California, Davis in 1960; sssistant geneticist at the University of California, Davis, 1960-1967; worked at the International Rice Research Institute for 35 years from 1967 to 2002 until retirement. Dr. Khush has long been engaged in breeding varieties of rice with high yield, good quality and resistance to diseases and pests. The representative rice varieties he bred, such as IR36, is the most widely spread variety of single crop in the world. Dr. Khush won the World Food Prize in 1996, the Wolf Prize in Agriculture in 2000, the Rank Prize in 1998 and the Japan Prize in 1987. In 1999 and 2001, Dr. Khush received the Chinese Government Friendship Award and the People's Republic of China Award for International Scientific and Technological Cooperation respectively.
Tang Shengxiang : former director of Genetic Resources Department of China Rice Research Institute; former director and liaison scientist of China Office of International Rice Research Institute(COIRRI). In the field of rice germplasm resources, genetics and breeding, a number of research achievements have been made. Over 130 papers have been published at home and abroad, with 5 monographs. He has won 7 famous awards including the first-class National Scientific and Technological Progress Award, the Ministry of Education Science and Technology Progress Award and Zhejiang province Science and Technology Award . As the former director and liaison scientist of the COIRRI, he played an important role in promoting, organizing and coordinating the cooperation projects between the International Rice Research Institute and China's relevant agricultural research institutes.
