The Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) held an interactive session on Friday with rice farmers in Region Two to highlight the performance of the new candidate rice variety – G-14-10.
The event was hosted at farmer Rafeek Khan’s 6.5-acre trial plot in La Belle Alliance, where the variety is currently being grown.
The candidate G-14-10 variety is expected to yield 120 lbs of seed per acre.
At the interactive session, GRDB General Manager, Badrie Persaud, told the farmers gathered, that the variety offers higher yields, is less prone to disease and offers more enhanced nutritional value.
Persaud also reaffirmed GRDB’s dedication to developing rice varieties suited to Guyana’s diverse climatic conditions, noting that this session was the final interactive meeting before the official release of the Candidate variety. He added that the rice industry is now stronger than in previous years, with new varieties providing farmers the opportunity for increased paddy yields.
Meanwhile, GRDB’s chief scientist and plant breeder, Dr Mahendra Persaud, thanked Rafeek Khan for offering his land for the trial and stressed the importance of farmer feedback during the sessions to refine the variety further.
Persaud, who leads GRDB’s rice breeding program, shared that the G-14-10 variety is high-yielding, tolerant to lodging, and has excellent grain quality. He also disclosed that the GRDB team is working on other innovative rice varieties, including aromatic rice, zinc-enriched rice, and varieties with salt and drought tolerance.
The Candidate G-14-10 variety boasts a high yield potential of over nine tons per hectare and matures faster and more robustly than previous varieties such as GRDB 10 and 16. It also allows for delayed harvesting by up to 16 days without compromising grain quality, with excellent milling recovery rates.
Farmer Rafeek Khan, who has over 300 acres of land under rice cultivation, expressed his satisfaction with the partnership, stating that higher-yielding varieties result in higher profits for farmers. He said once he reaps the expected amount he will expand to other lands.
Farmers present took advantage of the session to ask questions and visit the trial field to observe the new variety being grown. Also in attendance was agronomist Dr Ghansham Payman.
