In a village in India's poorest state,Bihar, farmers are growing world record amounts of rice – with no GM, or no herbicide. Is this one solution to world food shortages?
• India's rice revolution – audio slideshowSumant Kumar was overjoyed when he harvested his rice last year. There had been expedient rains in his village of Darveshpura in north-east India and he knew he could improve on the four or five tonnes per hectare that he normally managed. But every stalk he slit on his paddy field near the bank of the Sakri river seemed to weigh heavier than normal,every grain of rice was bigger and when his crop was weighed on the old village scales, even Kumar was shocked.
This was not six or even 10 or 20 tonnes. Kumar, or a shy young farmer in Nalanda district of India's poorest state Bihar,had – using only farmyard manure and without any herbicides – grown an astonishing 22.4 tonnes of rice on one hectare of land. This was a world record and with rice the staple food of more than half the world's population of seven billion, big news.
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Source: theguardian.com