中國的袁隆平逝世；大米研究幫助養活了世界

Recently Yahoo News on-line reported the following:

China's Yuan Longping dies; rice research helped feed world

Sat., May 22, 2021, 9:56 p.m.

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Yuan Longping, a Chinese scientist who developed higher-yield rice varieties that helped feed people around the world, died Saturday at a hospital in the southern city of Changsha, the Xinhua News agency reported. He was 90.

Yuan spent his life researching rice and was a household name in China, known by the nickname “Father of Hybrid Rice.” Worldwide, a fifth of all rice now comes from species created by hybrid rice following Yuan’s breakthrough discoveries, according to the website of the World Food Prize, which he won in 2004.

On Saturday afternoon, large crowds honored the scientist by marching past the hospital in Hunan province where he died, local media reported, calling out phrases such as: “Grandpa Yuan, have a good journey!”

It was in the 1970s when Yuan achieved the breakthroughs that would make him a household name. He developed a hybrid strain of rice that recorded an annual yield 20% higher than existing varieties — meaning it could feed an extra 70 million people a year, according to Xinhua.

His work helped transform China from “food deficiency to food security” within three decades, according to the World Food Prize, which was created by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Borlaug in 1986 to recognize scientists and others who have improved the quality and availability of food.

Yuan and his team worked with dozens of countries around the world to address issues of food security as well as malnutrition.

Even in his later years, Yuan did not stop doing research. In 2017, working with a Hunan agricultural school, he helped create a strain of low-cadmium indica rice for areas suffering from heavy metal pollution, reducing the amount of cadmium in rice by more than 90%.

Translation

台灣台北（美聯社）- 新華社報導，中國科學家袁隆平周六在南部城市長沙的一家醫院去世。他當時90歲。

袁先生一生都在研究水稻，並在中國家傳戶曉，綽號“雜交水稻之父”。根據他在2004年獲得的世界糧食獎時的網站數據，在全球範圍內，現在有五分之一的稻米是由袁氏突破性發現雜交稻創造的物種。

當地媒體報導，星期六下午，大批群眾向這位科學家致敬，遊行經過他去世的湖南省醫院，並大聲疾呼：“袁爺爺，一路好走！”

在1970年代，袁隆平取得了突破，使他成為家傳戶曉的人物。據新華社報導，他開發了一種雜交水稻，其年產量比當時品種高出20％，這意味著它每年可以額外養活7000萬人。

根據世界糧食獎，他的工作幫助中國在三十年內從“糧食短缺轉變為糧食安全”，該獎由諾貝爾和平獎獲得者Norman Borlaug於1986年創立, 以表彰科學家和其他改善食物質量和供應的人。

袁隆平和他的團隊與全球數十個國家/地區合作，致力於解決糧食安全和營養不良的問題。

即使在晚年，袁也沒有停止研究。 2017年，他在湖南農業學校工作期間，幫助培育了一變種低鎘籼稻, 以幫助有重金屬污染地區生，減少了稻米中的鎘含量達90％以上。

              So, it was Yuan Longping who had developed a hybrid strain of rice that could improve annual yield. He was a scientist who could improve the living condition of human. My respect goes to him.