The launch of a high-yielding dwarf rice variety by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) on 28 November 1966 marked the beginning of Asia's struggle for freedom from hunger. Perhaps drawn by the promise of the 'miracle rice' — the IR8 rice variety — the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) dedicated 1966 as the International Rice Year. Thirty-eight years later as the United Nations dedicates the year 2004 to the world's most important staple food once again, celebrating it as the International Year of Rice, the starchy grain has undergone complete metamorphosis.
In 1966, the miracle rice seeds that ushered in the green revolution belonged to the species Oryza sativa (the biological name for rice). Since the time the indica variety of wild rice was known to be growing in the northern and southern slopes of the Himalaya – some 15,000 years ago – rice has been regarded as probably God's greatest gift to humankind. Staple food for more than half the world's population, rice has come to be a part of the Asian culture itself. Nearly 91 percent of the world's rice is produced in Asia (nine of the top ten rice-producing countries are from Asia) and 92 percent of the produce is eaten in Asia. Rice is the principal food of three of the world's four most populous nations: the People´s Republic of China, India and Indonesia. Rice is what sustains more than 2.5 billion people in these three countries alone. For centuries, rice has been the sociology, tradition and lifeline for the majority world.
That was an era associated with Oryza sativa – a period when rice was freely available for farmers, consumers and the scientists. Whether it were the 200,000 plant accessions of rice that were known to be cultivated some 200 years ago, or the handful of dwarf and high-yielding rice varieties and its numerous national variants the world over that have led the march against hunger in the recent past, rice was a realm of nature.
As the world begins to commemorate the International Year of Rice 2004, a leading multinational agribusiness giant, Syngenta, has already claimed ownership of rice. In other words, the biological inheritance of the world's major food crop is now in the hands of a Swiss multinational. The journey of rice, beginning with the emergence of wild rice some 130 million years ago, crossing the Himalaya, passing through southern China, hopping to Japan, travelling to Africa, traded to the Middle East and the Mediterranean and shipped to Mexico and America, has finally ended at the banks of river Rhine in Basel, Switzerland — under the monopoly control of Syngenta.