An Overview Of Our Solution
The System of Rice Intensification (SRI) and its derived System of Crop Intensification (SCI) raise food production by 20-100% (or more) with less water & with reduced or no chemical fertilizer and agrochemicals, enhancing soil and water quality. SRI/SCI produce ‘more with less’ by modifying plant, soil, water & nutrient management so as to induce better root growth and functioning, and more abundance, diversity and activity of the soil biota. Originally developed for irrigated rice production, SRI works also in upland rainfed rice production. By adapting SRI ideas & methods to other crops, SCI enhances production of wheat, maize, millet, sugarcane, legumes and vegetables also (http://sri.cornell.edu.cornell). SRI/SCI methods strengthen crops’ resilience to biotic and abiotic stresses to better cope with climate change. They reduce net greenhouse gas emissions.
Who is this solution impacting?
Community Type
Rural
Additional Information
- Population Impacted:
- Continent: North America
General Information
Organization type
Other
Ecosystem (select all that apply)
Oceans/Coasts
Population impacted
At least 9.5 million
Challenge
Size of agricultural area
Initially developed for smallholders in LDCs (>2 ha); but with mechanization as demonstrated in Pakistan, it can operate on hundreds of hectares according to the same principles with appropriate adaptation of its principles and practices.
Production quantity
Variable; SRI paddy rice yields are 6-8 tons/ha, compared to world average of 4.4 tons/ha; and up to 15-20 t/ha with best use of practices and good ecosystem management. Sichuan Provincial Department of Agriculture in China reports 2.8 million tons of ad
People employed
SRI-Rice is a catalytic, facilitating organization that works mostly through its website (http://sri.cals.cornell.edu) and the internet. It currently has only one full-time staff member (Lucy Fisher), but three other SRI-Rice members contribute their time
Solution
Describe your solution
SRI, developed in Madagascar some 30 years ago by Fr. Henri Laulanie, makes it worthwhile for rice farmers to change some of their age-old practices like continuous flooding of paddies, crowding of many plants together & transplanting older, over-mature seedlings. Use of compost is promoted in preference to chemical fertilizer which alters & inhibits the soil biota in ways that are detrimental to plant, soil & human health. Use of ‘modern’ varieties in Madagascar and elsewhere reduces rice biodiversity. SRI methods enable farmers to get much higher yields from local landraces, making them competitive with high-yielding and hybrid varieties. SRI methods can boost yields from so-called ‘unimproved’ varieties from 1-3 t/ha to 4-6 t/ha & sometimes up to 8-10 t/ha. So SRI conserves rice biodiversity by making traditional rice varieties more profitable for farmers, being also more climate-resilient.
Soil biodiversity is enhanced by the reduction & elimination where possible, of chemical inputs, with increased organic soil amendments. Further, SRI has been promoted in Madagascar, Indonesia, Zambia, elsewhere to reduce agricultural pressures on rainforest ecosystems & wildlife that threaten above-ground biodiversity.
SRI management methods- starting with young seedlings or direct (widely-spaced) seeding, greatly reduced plant populations (by 80-90%), w no continuous flooding of paddies, increased organic matter, farmers can get higher-yielding, more robust, resilient crops.
Implementation
Describe your implementation
1. SRI methods were developed as noted above several decades ago but did not begin spreading beyond Madagascar until our Cornell-based activities began publicizing them in 2000. SRI-Rice was established in 2010 to institutionalize our efforts, supporting a set of national networks promoting SRI in respective countries. SRI-Rice is a communication hub for the whole world, assisting and being assisted by networks of colleagues in >50 counties which include NGOs, government organizations, research institutions, universities, farmer associations, private sector, and diverse individuals from religious ministers (Liberia) to government ministers (Cambodia). We support specific international networks to promote, evaluate and disseminate scientific research on SRI & to share information on equipment so that farmers can make their SRI work more labor-saving.
2. Once farmers know about SRI’s more productive, more profitable, environmentally-friendly methods, there is no reason to abandon them, unless farmers have no water control (flooding, so soil becomes anaerobic) or no access to organic matter for compost (and must return to chemical fertilizer).
3. The main requirement is a degree of water control, and preferably good access to vegetative organic matter or animal manures. Positive attitudes toward innovation and willingness to experiment & evaluate are also needed. Farmers must be willing & able to invest some time and labor in the learning process.
4. Farmer-participatory approach; some cooperation from civil-society, government or private agencies; local leadership that can come from any of these or the farming community.
5. Main obstacles have been open (and concealed) resistance from ‘mainstream’ scientific community, and covert opposition from commercial agribusiness interests that feel threatened by SRI bc no need to purchase new seeds or use fertilizers or agrochemicals. Overcome by growing body of scientific research, acceptance in international comm
External connections
SRI-Rice brings SRI knowledge and experience to farmers around the world by working with and through a variety of organizations and individuals. None support SRI-Rice (except the Better U Foundation, 2010-2013) and we must rely mostly on personal resources to sustain our operation. The following have worked with and support SRI application for a more eco-friendly agriculture:
Non-Governmental Organizations: ActionAid; ADRA; American Friends Service Committee; Buddhist Global Relief; CARITAS; Catholic Relief Services; Inter-American Institute for Agricultural Cooperation (IICA); Japanese Overseas Cooperation Volunteers; Latter Day Saints (LDS) Charities; Lutheran World Federation; Mennonite Central Committee; Mercy Corps; Oxfam-America/Australia/Great Britain/New Zealand; Pro-Net 21; Rotary Club-Lille Est (France); SNV (Netherlands Development Organization); World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)
Donor Agencies: Agence Française de Dèveloppement; Asian Development Bank; Australian Aid; European Union; FAO; GTZ/GIZ; IFAD; Norwegian Government; Swiss Development Cooperation; USAID; U.S. Peace Corps; World Bank
Foundations: Aga Khan Foundation; The Asia Foundation; Jim Carrey’s Better U Foundation; Rockefeller Foundation; Tata Trusts; Syngenta Development Foundation
Private Companies: Ambuja Cement Corporation and Usha Martin Ltd (India); Buddha Air (Nepal); Garuda Airlines and PT Sampoerna (Indonesia); Lotus Foods (US); Nippon Koei (Japan); Syngenta Bangladesh Ltd
Results
What is the environmental or ecological challenge you are targeting with your solution?
(a) Grow more rice crop with less water: meta-analysis shows higher rice yields with 22% less total water/ha and 35% less irrigation water/ha; total water use efficiency (kg rice per m3) increased by 52% and irrigation water use efficiency by 78%; (b) Reduce crop vulnerability to drought, storm damage, and temperature extremes worsening with climate change -- evidence can be provided; (c) Reduce net greenhouse gas emissions -- CH4 less with cessation of flooding rice paddies, no offsetting increases in N2O; CO2 less with reduced use of fertilizer and chemical biocides; 40% reduction in GWP calculated from Oxford study in India; (d) Reduce crop losses to pests and diseases -- evidence of enhanced crop resistance to biotic stresses can be provided; (e) Safeguard water quality and enhance soil health -- by reducing agrochemical use; (f) Reduce energy consumption in irrigation -- 74% reduction in fossil-fuel consumption.** These figures pertain only to SRI irrigated rice production
Describe the context in which you are operating
That SRI induces more productive phenotypes from given genotypes (varieties) has been shown in >50 countries, from the tropics to rainfed upland areas to arid conditions to mountain regions to temperate-cold regions; it is not limited by soil pH or soil structure.* In Nepal, SRI raises yields between 100 m to 2700 m; in Madagascar from sea level to 1400 m. With crops like finger millet tolerant of low moisture regimes, SCI succeeds with less water because of the larger root systems and enhancement of life in the soil. SRI/SCI agroecological methods of crop management thus work in practically all contexts, although no claims of universality are made. Any agricultural system needs always to be tested and evaluated under specific field conditions. We have not found contexts where these methods do not create benefits, but they succeed more under some conditions than others. A degree of water control is needed to apply less water but reliably; so pumped irrigation is more favorable
How did you impact natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions?
By wider plant spacing and enhancing soil organic matter, with growth of larger root systems and greater, more diverse populations of soil organisms, soil biodiversity is directly and quickly improved. Making indigenous varieties (landraces) more productive and more profitable and thus competitive with ‘modern’ varieties countervails the loss of genetic diversity for the Oryza genus.
SRI also enhances the productivity of indigenous Oryza glaberrima in Africa, making these landraces more competitive with imported varieties of Oryza sativa. Further, by raising the productivity of lowland and upland rice cultivation, SRI reduces need to convert wild areas for arable use. With less need for irrigation water, SRI diminishes rice-growing’s competition with natural ecosystems for this natural resource.
As SRI ideas and methods are extended, extrapolated to other crops, raising agricultural productivity more generally should make meeting the world’s food needs less water- & land-consuming.
Language(s)
English
Water
By promoting root growth and the life in the soil, including mycorrhizal fungi, SRI enables plants to access moisture from a larger volume of soil, which itself has more reserves of water and is better able, with improved structure, to absorb and retain water. SRI enhances what is now referred to as ‘green water,’ reducing crop need for ‘blue water.’ Figures on water saving and improved water use efficiency with SRI management were given above under Context Analysis.
Food Security/Nutrition
By producing more robust and resilient phenotypes from any given genotype, SRI/SCI methods make crops less vulnerable to the biotic and abiotic stresses increasing with climate change. This gives more assurance of food availability. There is some evidence that with SRI management (and enhanced microbial populations of microorganisms in the soil), there is more micronutrient uptake in rice plants and higher concentrations of micronutrients (Fe, Zn, Mg, Cu) in the grain.
Economic/Sustainable Development
Agricultural production that is less dependent on purchased inputs lowers farmers’ costs of production. An IWMI-TNAU evaluation in India of >2200 farmers across 13 states found that SRI methods reduced costs of production per ton of paddy by $18 (Econ & Pol Weekly, 2013). This together with higher yields increased farmers’ incomes substantially. SRI’s agroecological methods are certainly more sustainable than current chemical-dependent modes of agricultural production.
Climate
Improving crops’ root systems and soil health gives crops more resilience to climate stresses: drought, storm damage, cold snaps, as well as pest and disease incidence, which will be enhanced by climate change. SRI by ending continuous flooding of paddy fields and minimizing inorganic N applications lowers methane emissions without prompting offsetting nitrous oxide generation. With SRI methods, global warming potential has been calculated, using life-cycle analysis in India, to be reduced by 40
Sustainability
SRI is not a conventional technology. It is composed of ideas & insights, empirically derived & scientifically substantiated. It does not need grant funding, government subsidies or market revenues. Once farmers are provided with SRI knowledge, they can use it, for as long as it benefits them. This gives SRI more sustainability than most other innovations. It capitalizes on biological processes & potentials, rather than relying on chemical or engineering interventions. More output is produced w less material input. This may sound like the mythical perpetual motion machine, but it is achieved by SRI methods mobilizing services & protection of myriad organisms in the soil & rhizosphere & also as symbiotic endophytes in the plants themselves.
Return on investment
Because SRI is not a conventional technology, being knowledge-intensive and more labor intensive than capital-intensive, the costs involved are those for disseminating knowledge, to demonstrate and evaluate it, to train farmers and to train trainers of farmers. Once the methods are learned and accepted, little further cost is involved. The methods decrease rather than increase farmers’ costs of production, so at farm level there is, mathematically speaking, an infinite benefit-cost ratio. But there are costs for investing in the dissemination and refinement of knowledge. These have been borne mostly by SRI-Rice and colleagues around the world who cooperate with it, as various donor and government agencies and NGOs get involved.
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Replication and Scale
How could we successfully replicate this solution elsewhere?
Dissemination is a more appropriate word for SRI than replication. We have already been able to get SRI knowledge, through many channels and diverse strategies, to about 20 million farmers in >50 countries. Our efforts have had an enormous economic multiplier effect, in the 00s if not 000s, enabling farmers to produce more with less -- less money, less water, less seeds, even less labor. A rough but defensible estimate of the value created by SRI knowledge in 2016 is over $2.3 billion, not attributing any value to the vast water savings resulting.
SRI-Rice cannot keep up with the demand for its support; we cannot continue sustaining SRI-Rice services mostly from personal resources as has been done in the past. Donor agencies, governments and civil society organizations have taken advantage of and used SRI knowledge in a decentralized way, and we have indeed invited such ‘free-riding.’ But unfortunately SRI-Rice has not been able to mobilize funding to support its core functions