science

International Rice Research Institute

International Rice Research Institute is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand International Rice Research Institute rather than just read about it. In short: The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is an international agricultural research and training organization with its headquarters in Los Baños, Philippines, and offices in seventeen countries. IRRI is known for its work in developing rice varieties that contributed to the Green Revolution in the 1960s which preempted the famine in Asia.

Key takeaways

International Rice Research Institute belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect International Rice Research Institute to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of International Rice Research Institute from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is an international agricultural research and training organization with its headquarters in Los Baños, Philippines, and offices in seventeen countries. IRRI is known for its work in developing rice varieties that contributed to the Green Revolution in the 1960s which preempted the famine in Asia. The institute was established in 1960 aims to reduce poverty and hunger, improve the health of rice farmers and consumers, and ensure environmental sustainability of rice farming. It advances its mission through collaborative research, partnerships, and the strengthening of the national agricultural research and extension systems of the countries IRRI works in. IRRI is one of 15 agricultural research centers in the world that form the CGIAR Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers, a global partnership of organizations engaged in research on food security. It is also the largest non-profit agricultural research center in Asia.

Origins IRRI was established in 1960 with the support of the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Government of the Philippines. It was intended to be an autonomous, philanthropic, tax-free, non-profit, non-stock organization designed to carry out the principal objective of conducting "basic research on the rice plant, on all phases of rice production, management, distribution and utilization with a view to attaining nutritive and economic advantage or benefit for the people of Asia and other major rice-growing areas through improvement in quality and quantity of rice." An International treaty titled: Agreement Recognising the International Legal Personality of the International Rice Research Institute was tabled in Manila on 19 May 1995.

Impact

IRRI is well known for its contribution to the "Green Revolution" movement in Asia during the late 1960s and 1970s, which involved the breeding of "semi-dwarf" varieties of rice that were less likely to lodge (fall over). IRRI's semi-dwarf varieties, including the famous IR8, saved India from famine in the 1960s. The varieties developed at IRRI, known as IR varieties, are well accepted in many Asian countries. In 2005, it was estimated that 60% of the world's rice area was planted to IRRI-bred rice varieties or their progenies. A report published by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research in 2011 assessed the impact of IRRI's breeding work in three countries in South East Asia between 1985 and 2009. It found IRRI's breeding work delivered an annual benefit of US$1.46 billion and boosted rice yields up to 13%. IRRI, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and BGI (formerly known as the Beijing Genomics Institute) have "identified the exact genetic makeup of more than 3,000 different families of rice for the first time in what is being heralded as a major advancement in rice science." For five decades, IRRI has provided a place for scientists and future leaders in rice research to learn. Since 1964, over 15,000 scientists have undergone training at IRRI to conduct rice research.

Golden rice IRRI is pursuing the development of "golden rice". Geneticists inserted two genes into the rice plant that allows it to produce beta carotene, which makes its grains yellow. Because the human body converts beta carotene to vitamin A, golden rice has the potential to dramatically improve the lives of millions of people around the world, particularly in Africa and Southeast Asia, where vitamin A deficiency is an especially common malady that can cause blindness and increases the risk of death from disease. Children are particularly vulnerable; according to the World Health Organization, "An estimated 250,000 to 500,000 vitamin A-deficient children become blind every year, half of them dying within 12 months of losing their sight". In August 2013, anti-genetically modified organism protestors broke into IRRI's research facilities and destroyed field trials of golden rice. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation supported IRRI in its development of golden rice.

Research

IRRI's website states that their research themes consist of:

THEME 1: Harnessing genetic diversity to chart new productivity, quality, and health horizons THEME 2: Accelerating the development, delivery, and adoption of improved rice varieties THEME 3: Ecological and sustainable management of rice-based production systems THEME 4: Extracting more value from rice harvests through improved quality, processing, market systems, and new products THEME 5: Technology evaluations, targeting, and policy options for enhanced impact

THEME 6: Supporting the growth of the global rice sector Additionally, the organisation describes their expertise as including:

conserving, understanding, sharing, and using rice genetic diversity; breeding and delivering new varieties; developing and sharing improved crop and environmental management practices; adding to the economic and nutritional value of rice; broadening our impact by supporting strategic policy and market development; and facilitating large-scale adoption of technologies. In 2010, the Global Rice Science Partnership (GRiSP) was launched, which IRRI leads in Asia, the Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice) leads in Africa, and International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) leads in Latin America. It aims to "dramatically improve the ability of rice farmers to feed growing populations in some of the world's poorest nations".

Awards In 1969, IRRI was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for International Understanding. The Ramon Magsaysay Award is an annual award was established in 1957 by the trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund based in New York City, with the concurrence of the Philippine government, to "perpetuate former Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay's example of integrity in governance, courageous service to the people, and pragmatic idealism within a democratic society". This award is Asia's highest honor and widely regarded as the Asian equivalent to the Nobel Prize. The Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation posited that IRRI represented "the first coordinated international attempt in the tropics to solve a major problem of world agriculture", while also stating:

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with International Rice Research Institute

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what International Rice Research Institute claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to International Rice Research Institute before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about International Rice Research Institute ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of International Rice Research Institute

In research: International Rice Research Institute appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses International Rice Research Institute in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: International Rice Research Institute is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1960 establishments in the Philippines, Agricultural organizations based in the Philippines, International research institutes, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for International Rice Research Institute outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study International Rice Research Institute in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what International Rice Research Institute means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain International Rice Research Institute out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is International Rice Research Institute in simple terms?

Why does International Rice Research Institute matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study International Rice Research Institute?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on International Rice Research Institute.