About NERICA and the Africa Rice Center
The ‘New Rice for Africa’ (NERICA) is a symbol of hope to more than 30 million African rice farmers, mostly smallholder producers. It was developed by the Africa Rice Center (WARDA) and its partners.
NERICA is well adapted to the harsh growing environment in sub-Saharan Africa, where smallholder farmers lack the means to irrigate and apply chemical fertilizers or pesticides. It responds even better to higher inputs.
Africa Rice Center (WARDA) is an autonomous inter-governmental research association of African member states. It is also one of the 15 international Centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).
For more information on NERICA and WARDA, visit our website at www.warda.org
The Secret of Nerica
Conceived and Written by Savitri Mohapatra Designed and Illustrated by Pramod Sahoo
Who is the best? “I am the best in Africa, because I am so hardy,” declared the Red Rice, proudly shaking its head. It was called the Red Rice because its husk or its seed cover was reddish brown. It was also known as the African Rice.
Just then a strong gust of wind blew across the rice field and the plant started swaying badly. “Oh! Oh! I am going to fall down,” it cried.
“What a joke, calling yourself the best!” exclaimed the White Rice, which had cream-colored husk. It was also known as the Asian Rice. “You can’t even stand properly and carry the few grains you have. I have many more grains than you. Yet I am so steady! Surely, I am the best.” The Red Rice sniggered. “Don’t you remember what the Rice Doctor told Karine the other day? He said that I have been in Africa since 3000 years, while you came to Africa from Asia just 500 years ago.”
“Oh yes. I also remember him saying that you are fast disappearing from Africa, because so few farmers are growing the African Rice. I have replaced you almost everywhere in Africa,” retorted the White Rice. “Hey, you two, stop quarreling,” shouted Karine, who had just returned from her school. “What’s the problem?” “I want to join the African Rice Competition, and show everyone that I am the best rice in Africa,” said the Red Rice and the White Rice together.
“Oh then, you don’t need to quarrel,” replied Karine. “I heard Mamma say that she will enter both of you in the Competition.” “Really!” exclaimed both the Rices, very happy.
The Competition Next day, Mamma and Karine went to visit the Rice Doctor who was organizing the Rice Competition. They took the Red Rice and White Rice with them to show to him.
“Thank you for coming,” said the Rice Doctor. “I wish to explain to you about the competition. First of all, there will not be just one competition, but several. The rice plants will be tested for many qualities.” Hearing this, Karine asked, “What are qualities, Doctor?”
“Have you ever joined a painting or dancing or running competition with other children, Karine?” the Rice Doctor asked
“Oh yes, I came first in our school running competition and I also danced well, but I didn’t do so well in the painting competition,” replied Karine.
“Ok, in the same way, we test plants to see how fast they grow, how much rice they produce, are they strong enough to ward off plant diseases and insect pests that attack them, and so on,” explained the Rice Doctor.
Karine smiled and said, “Ok, I understand now. Like us, other farmers have also brought their best rices and all these will be tested to see which ones are really good.” “Yes, you are right, Karine,” replied the Rice Doctor.
Who will be the judge? Karine was keen to find out who would examine the rice plants and give the scores in the Competition. “Are you going to be the judge?” she asked the Rice Doctor.
“Oh no!” replied the Doctor. “The farmers will be the judges, Karine, and you too can give your opinion.” “Wow!” said Karine, clapping her hands. “I shall tell my friends and they will be so jealous of me.”
“I also wanted to tell you that there are Rice Scientists like me who study rice. We try to mix the best qualities from different rice plants and develop some improved ones. So these improved rice plants will also be tested.” “Ok,” said Karine. “Can we start now?”
“First, the rice farmers here will grow all these types of rice in their fields and we will invite you to come and judge as many times as you want.” “Great!” said Karine.
“I am sure you will want to see the plants when they begin to have flowers, when their grains are ripe, when you mill the grains and use them for cooking and finally when you taste the cooked grains,” said the Rice Doctor. “It’s really a tough examination for the rices,” observed Karine. “It sure is, and at the end of the tests, we will look at all the scores you have given and declare who are the champions,” said the Rice Doctor. “Once we know the best plants you like, we will advise more rice farmers to grow them.”
How to judge? Karine was very excited. She had already gone many times with her Mamma to examine the rice plants and give her judgment in the Rice Competition. Today was a great day as they would eat the cooked rice, after which the final results would be announced.
“Hey, Karine, did I perform well? Please tell me how much score I got,” whispered the Red Rice, not wanting the White Rice to find out.
“Don’t be stupid, the farmers didn’t even look at you. All their eyes were on my ripe grains,” said the White Rice.
Karine didn’t want to hurt their feelings. She liked them, but she had heard Mamma and her aunts complain that they had too many problems with both the Red Rice and the White Rice.
White rice (Asian rice)
The Red Rice is able to survive under bad conditions, but it gives too few grains, the plants tend to fall over and the grains are so loosely held to the plant that even before farmers can harvest them, they drop from the plants and lie scattered on the
The White Rice is not satisfactory for farmers like Mamma, because it needs great care. Even though it can produce lots of grains, it does not grow well when there is not enough rain or if the soil is bad.
Red rice (African rice)
ground. The grains are also brittle and break during milling.
When Karine and Mamma reached the fields where the Rice Competition was being held, they saw many farmers. All were wearing colorful dresses and were dancing and singing. At one place, some women were cooking rice in big pots. “I hope you are very hungry now, because you are going to taste many types of rice and then you will tell me which ones you like,” said the Rice Doctor to the whole group.
Karine had never tasted so many types of rice before. Some grains were full, some broken, some short, some long, some thin, some fat, some white, some brown, some sweet, some not so sweet, some fragrant, some with no fragrance, some a little sticky, some non-sticky, some fluffy, some not so fluffy… Oh it was so difficult to judge which rices were among the best.
But finally it was all over and they waited for the announcement of the results.
Who is the champion? “It has been a difficult exercise,” began the Rice Doctor. “One point which is interesting is that men farmers and women farmers like different qualities in rice.
Karine already knew what qualities children like in their rice: it should taste good!
“For example, as women spend many hours pulling out weeds, they want rice plants that can compete well with weeds,” the Rice Doctor continued.
“What are weeds, Mamma?” asked Karine.
Mamma showed Karine some plants that were growing in the rice fields. “See these plants. These plants soak up the sunlight, water and food that our rice plants need to grow well. So we have to pull them out from our rice field.” “Thanks, Mamma,” Karine replied. She was now getting impatient to know the results of the competition. “So, who is the champion, Doctor?”
“As I told you, farmers like different qualities. They like rice plants which can produce some rice even if there is little rain or the soil is bad. For this, a few farmers have given good scores to the African Rice,� said the Rice Doctor. The Red Rice was very happy and winked at the White Rice.
“The Asian Rice has also performed well when it received enough water and grew in good soils,” added the Rice Doctor. It was the turn of the White Rice to wink at the Red Rice. “But the maximum number of farmers, who grow rice on dry land, have preferred the Nerica rice plants,” announced the Rice Doctor.
Nerica? What’s that? “Nerica? Is that the name of the new rice plants I saw in the competition?” asked Karine. “Oh, some of them smelt so good that I wanted to eat the plants!”
“Yes,” answered Bintu, Mamma’s friend, laughing at Karine’s remark. She was already growing Nerica in her field. “There are many types of Nerica and we like some of them because they have the best qualities of the Red Rice and the White Rice.” “Oh yes,” said a few other farmers who also grew Nerica. “They are productive; they can grow like maize on dry land, unlike most of the rice grown in Asia which needs lots of water. And if we take good care of them, we can get enough rice to eat, plus extra rice that we can sell.” Hearing this, all the farmers cheered and danced. “And most important of all, the Nerica plants grow quite fast. We can harvest the rice in about 3 months after sowing, not like our other rice plants which take about 5 months to harvest,” Bintu added.
“Some Nerica rices are also good for our health, because they contain more protein than the foreign rice that is sold in our local markets,” the Rice Doctor stated. Immediately, there was a big commotion as all the rice farmers standing there asked for Nerica seeds to grow in their farms. The Rice Doctor gave a small quantity of Nerica seeds to everyone. Karine also took some home. She was very keen to find out the secret of Nerica. “How is it that it has so many good qualities? Is there some magic in it?” she wondered.
She put the seeds in a bottle and examined it every night to see if the seeds would glow because of magic. But since she didn’t see any change in the seed, she asked her Mamma if she knew the secret of the Nerica. “I don’t know, Karine. But why don’t you ask the Rice Doctor, when he visits us next time?” advised Mamma.
What’s the secret of Nerica ?
“So you want to know the secret of Nerica,” the Rice Doctor smiled at Karine. “But part of the secret lies in your own rice field. You are really hiding a treasure here.” “We have a treasure in our field?” asked Karine, her eyes full of wonder. She wanted to dig her field immediately to find the treasure.
“Yes, it’s right here,” the Rice Doctor said, pointing at the Red Rice. “For us, the African Rice is a treasure because it has so many good qualities. Since it has been growing in Africa for hundreds of years, it has learnt all the tricks to fight with problems that a rice plant faces in Africa. It is a real fighter, you know.”
Karine started to laugh, caressing the Red Rice, “You are speaking of our Red Rice as if it were a karate champion. But it’s true, that’s why my Mamma continues to grow it, although most of our neighbors have replaced it with the White Rice,” said Karine.
“We are truly thankful to farmers like your Mamma, because they have preserved this valuable rice,” the Rice Doctor said. “Some people in our land believe that it was given as a gift from the heavens and they continue to grow it in order to keep a link with their ancestors. “We also like its taste,” Karine said.
“For those of us who study rice to develop improved rice plants, we try to transfer the best qualities of the African Rice into the best Asian Rice plants,” the Rice Doctor explained. “Now I understand. That is how you made the Nerica rice plants. It has the best qualities of the Red Rice and the White Rice,” exclaimed Karine, very happy that she had at last found the secret of Nerica. “Yes, Karine, in many ways Nerica is better than both its parents,” said the Rice Doctor. “But it was very difficult to do this work, because the African Rice and the Asian Rice are not closely related. Although some people had tried to do this earlier, they had failed. Only ‘Papa Nerica’ and his team were successful.” Karine was amazed that there was even a Papa Nerica! “How did he do it?” she demanded. “I shall take you to the place where Nerica was developed. Then you will understand a little better,” said the Rice Doctor.
Where is Nerica’s birthplace?
“This is the Africa Rice Center,” said the Rice Doctor. Karine looked with great wonder at all the grown-ups who were studying rice to help farmers like her Mamma. “Let me first show you the bank where we store the rice seeds,” the Rice Doctor said. Karine thought these grown-ups were very strange because they stored rice seeds instead of money in their bank.
“It is actually called a rice genebank – you can call it a seed bank,” stated the Rice Doctor, taking Karine to a place where thousands of rice seeds were stored. “There are so many types of Red Rice here,” Karine exclaimed. “Yes,” said the Rice Doctor. “We have collected all these rice seeds from many places in Africa, from forests, hills and valleys, and particularly from farmers’ fields.”
Karine was very happy to see the rice genebank. “So, Papa Nerica used these seeds to do his work?” she asked.
“You are right,” answered the Rice Doctor. He told Karine about Papa Nerica’s dream to help rice farmers like her Mamma who struggled so hard because they did not have the right type of rice plants.
“Isn’t it great that he was able to fulfill his dream and develop the Nerica rice plants for us?” said Karine.
Nerica in Africa
“Oh! Yes. Nerica rice plants have now reached farmers in many countries of Africa,� the Rice Doctor added. Karine looked at her Nerica seeds with great admiration. She realized that they were not created by magic, but through lots of studies and hard work and through the help of farmers, like her Mamma.
Is it the end of the Nerica story? “But that’s not the end of the story of Nerica, Karine,” the Rice Doctor said. “There are others like Papa Nerica, who are continuing to study rice and we now have Nerica rices that can grow well in valleys with water.” He showed Karine the new rice plants called Lowland Nericas. “These plants can produce large amounts of rice, and in Africa we have huge areas of lowlands where the new Nericas can grow. Then we will have more rice and our governments can then stop spending lots of money on buying foreign rice.”
“Wow!” exclaimed Karine. “I am going to study hard and be like you so that I can help many farmers and my country.” The Rice Doctor patted Karine’s head. “Of course, you can. Farmers who are growing Nerica are able to send their children to school and buy medicine for them when they fall ill, because Nerica gives so much rice that farmers have enough to eat and sell,” said the Rice Doctor. Karine was very happy because she remembered how much her Mamma struggled to pay the school fees and medical bills for her and her three brothers.
“However, as the farmers who are growing Nerica have more money now, they can buy more healthy food for their children. So their children don’t fall ill so often,” the Rice Doctor added. “Oh thank you, Nerica, you are our own rice and I am so very proud of you,” said Karine, hugging the Nerica seeds.
About CGIAR The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is a strategic alliance of countries, international and regional organizations, and private foundations supporting 15 international agricultural Centers that work with national agricultural research systems and civil society organizations including the private sector. The alliance mobilizes agricultural science to reduce poverty, foster human well being, promote agricultural growth and protect the environment. The CGIAR generates global public goods that are available to all. www.cgiar.org
Africa Rice Center (WARDA) 01 B.P. 2031, Cotonou, Benin Tel (229) 21 35 01 88 Fax (229) 21 35 05 56 Email: warda@cgiar.org www.warda.org © Africa Rice Center 2006