New stress-tolerant ARICA rice varieties for Africa

The Africa-wide Rice Breeding Task Force, convened by the Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice), has recently nominated six varieties with improved tolerance to environmental stresses as ARICA, which stands for Advanced Rice Varieties for Africa.

The ARICA varieties are selected through a rigorous multi-environment testing process including regional and national trials as well as participatory varietal selection involving farmers.

The varieties were evaluated through the project Stress-Tolerant Rice for Africa and South Asia (STRASA), which is helping farmers who produce their crop under predominantly rainfed conditions, in which stresses such as drought, flood, cold, salinity and iron toxicity reduce yields.

The STRASA project is being implemented by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and AfricaRice in partnership with national programs with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It covers 18 countries in Africa.

The project is linking up with various partners, including non-governmental organizations, such as the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and BRAC as well as private seed producers, such as FEPRODES and NAFASO, for dissemination of improved seed in Africa.

Listen to the comments on this exciting development from rice experts. 

Speakers in the podcast (in order of intervention)

Baboucarr Manneh, AfricaRice Irrigated Rice Breeder and STRASA-Africa Coordinator.

Kofi Bimpong, AfricaRice Molecular Biologist.

Moussa Sié, AfricaRice Senior Breeder and Breeding Task Force Coordinator

Ibnou Dieng, AfricaRice Biometrician

Gary Atlin, Senior Program Officer, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Peinda Cissé, Rice Seed Producer and Founder-President of FEPRODES Women's Association, Senegal

Abdoulaye Sawadogo, Rice Seed Producer and Director of  NAFASO, Burkina Faso

Issoufou Kapran, Program Officer for Seed Production and Dissemination, Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)

Podcast by : R.Raman, AfricaRice, Savitri Mohapatra, AfricaRice