Ma. Regina Alexa E.

Cuevas
AGRI 31 Y-1L
My PhilRice Experience
During our mini “field trip” to Philippine Rice Research Institute or more commonly known as
PhilRice, our class was taught about breeding rice. Crop breeding of rice is an extensive process which
takes years to complete before it can be commercialized and made available to the public. Rice is a crop
which has both male and female parts, and for breeding to happen, rice must be made female first. Each
spikelet in a panicle has six anthers, the male reproductive system, and those anthers must be removed
individually using Iris scissors and pointed metal forceps. The whole process is quite impressive though
laborious since the anthers could be seen with the naked eye and pulled from the spikelet. However, caution
must be kept in mind since these anthers are tiny and small, and thus may break during removal.
In the process of transforming rice into a female, timing is also important. This explains the
phenomena in the morning where the dust particles I see in the morning swirling in the air, are actually
pollen. This is because, at around eight in the morning, pollen is released through the anthers and even just
the slightest breeze could spread the pollen around. After the aforementioned time frame, pollen can no
longer be released no matter how hard the crop is shaken. Imagine the hard work being placed into just one
of the eight steps in breeding rice, astonishing.
When the rice has been made female, breeding can now take place and just like in animals, breed
complementarity is taken into account. If the seeds produced are of god quality, then numerous seasons and
generations are done before it can be approved by the NCT and NSIC.
For the second part of our field trip, we went to the post-harvesting facility of PhilRice where the
approved rice breeds are stored and kept for years for future purposes and reference. These seeds are stored
in a cold room called the "seed bank" where there must be continuous supply of electricity to maintain the
relative humidity and temperature of the seeds otherwise, they may become spoiled. This must be avoided
since these seeds are considered as breeding lines for future rice breeds. Also, the rice seeds here must be
checked regularly if they are still alive through monitoring germination.
In another cold room, nucleus and breeder seeds are kept which came from the parent seeds. These
seeds are ready for commercialisation if there are orders coming from business and farmers alike. The ate
who was touring us mentioned that profit is quite high in the rice breeding business since rice breeding is
an expensive process.
All in all, crop breeding is both an art and science where parents are picked according to their
favourable characteristics and then a series of steps must be followed to produce next-generation seeds. It
is an exhaustive process that takes years to finish but its result could produce new lines of rice more suitable
to our ever-changing climate.