2004-4-5
This is Steve Ember with the VOA Special English Agriculture
Report.
Scientists from China and Sierra Leone are the winners of this
year's World Food Prize. The winners were announced at a ceremony in
Washington, D.C. led by Secretary of State Colin Powell last Monday.
Chinese Professor Yuan Longping and Monty Jones will share the
two-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar prize. Both men are being honored
for work they did to improve rice production in developing
countries. Two-thousand-four is the International Year of Rice.
Professor Yuan is head of the National Hybrid Rice Research and
Development Center in Hunan, China. He received his share of the
prize for work he did in the nineteen-seventies.
Mister Yuan developed ways to genetically combine different kinds
of rice to increase production. He discovered that combining two
kinds of rice results in a better, more productive new rice. He
established the hybrid rice seed industry in China. He also shared
research and helped train scientists from more than twenty-five
countries. For his efforts, Mister Yuan is called the "Father of
Hybrid Rice."
Monty Jones is being honored for his part in developing the "New
Rice for Africa" or NERICA. He developed NERICA while he was head of
the Upland Rice Breeding Program. At the time, the program was part
of the West Africa Rice Development Agency in Ivory Coast.
NERICA is a combination of Asian and traditional African kinds of
rice. It resists insects and dry conditions and can produce up to
fifty percent more rice. It also grows faster and contains more
protein than rice native to West Africa. Mister Jones is now a top
official of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa in Accra,
Ghana.
The two scientists will officially receive their prize on October
fourteenth in Des Moines, Iowa.
Norman Borlaug first developed the
idea of a world food prize. He wanted to honor people who increased
food production to help feed the growing world population.
Mister Borlaug knows something about major prizes. He won the
Nobel Peace Prize in nineteen-seventy. He received the award for his
work to develop more productive agriculture.
Iowa businessman John Ruan provides the money for the World Food
Prize. He began his support in nineteen-ninety. The World Food Prize
Foundation has given the prize every year since
nineteen-eighty-seven.
This VOA Special English Agriculture Report was written by Mario
Ritter. This is Steve Ember.