Vrihi: An Effort to Conserve Folk Rice Varieties

Dr. Debal DebCentre for Interdisciplinary Studies

Barrackporewww.cintdis.org/Vrihi.html

MASSIVE EROSION OF FOLK CROP GENETIC DIVERSITY

• West Bengal had over 5,550 Rice landraces until 1975.

• Over 5,200 of these varieties were shipped to IRRI between 1965-75.

• Our intensive search over the past 11 years have recovered only 640 landraces.

• The extant varieties include: FLOOD-TOLERANT, DROUGHT-TOLERANT, SALT-

TOLERANT, AROMATIC AND MEDICINAL VARIETIES.

In Situ Conservation of Folk Crop Genetic Diversity

● Vrihi was founded in 1997● Works on the principle of Local Ex Situ

Seed Bank● Distributes seeds to Farmers for Free● Expands Seeds Exchange Network ● Documents Varietal Characteristics of Each

Landrace following INGER Guidelines

Accession and In Situ Conservation

● Vrihi has a collection of 920 Distinct Traditional Varieties – the largest in eastern India.

● Includes rare and unique germplasm – like salt-tolerant varieties, flood tolerant varieties and drought tolerant varieties.

● Each Landrace has been characterised and documented.

AMAZING FARMER INNOVATIONSJugal: The Double-Grain Rice

AMAZING FARMER INNOVATIONSSateen: The Three-Grain Rice

On-Farm Research in Agroecology

* Agrobiodiversity Documentation*  Enumeration of Pests and Predators in Different Afgroecosystems* Study of Agronomic Consequences of Farm Micro­habitat Diversity Enhancement*  Study on Food Web Structural Complexity*  Estimation of Eoclogiucal Resilience of Agroecosystems* Experiments with Different Cultivation Systems (Mulching, Cover Crops, Types of Composting, SRI etc.)

Rice Farm Food Web

Publications from Vrihi's Research

1. 1994. Industrial vs Ecological Agriculture (RFSTE, New Delhi)

2. 1995. Seeds of Tradition, Seeds of Future: Folk Rice Varieties of Eastern India (RFSTE, New Delhi)

3. 2009. ”Valuing folk crop varieties for agroecology and food security” Bioscience Resource 10: 7-12.

4. 2009. ”Biodiversity and complexity of rice farm ecosystems: An empirical assessment” Open Ecology Journal 2: 112-129.

5. 2010. ”Two unique rice varieties from West Bengal” Seed Research 43 (forthcoming)

Vrihi's Recognition

1. Circolo Culturale Ambientescienze (Cremona, Italy) recognized Vrihi as ”Conservator of Global Significance” (2007)

2. FAO recognized Vrihi's effort as ”One of the best examples of crop genetic diversity conservation through community effort” (2008)

3. PVPFRA, endowed Vrihi with the National Plant Genome Saviour Award (2009)

From Negligence to Plagiarism

1. The W.B. State Agriculture Directorate considered Vrihi's effort to be of no significance.

2. The Director even told in 2000 that effort to conserve traditional crop varieties was futile, unscientific, and anti-progress.

3. In 2008 and 2009, the Director reproduced text and photographs from my copyrighted book, without acknowledgement and citation, and puboished them as his own work.

Photo of JugalReplica (L)Original (R)

Photo of SateenReplica (L) Original (R)

Photos of Jugal and Sateen (Original)