Rice

Rice is the staple crop for more than 70 per cent of Indians. It is grown in an area of 44 million hectares with a production of 90 million tonnes per year. India is the second largest producer of paddy in the world after China. Small and marginal farmers, who contribute 78 per cent of the total food production, cultivate paddy. These farmers have evolved numerous paddy varieties that suit dry lands and water logged saline regions. The country boasted to have had 30,000 varieties of paddy crops. Unfortunately, our failure to recognise the part they played in ensuring the country’s food security has made many of the varieties to go extinct. Now, just 3,000 of them are said to be existing.