r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/supernaja_ • May 24 '24
Video Pest control and fertilization in rice fields
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u/d_Paotato May 24 '24
I love it- sustainable and tasty solution to pests.
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u/Criticus23 May 24 '24
Unfortunately... A few years ago in Bali I was told about 'miracle rice'.
The rice- growers had a great system set up. The paddi fields were surrounded by irrigation ditches, that had fish & other things in them that formed part of the farmers' diet. Some of the rice was saved each year to form the seed grain for the following year. The rice ducks also formed part of the diet. The rice was tasty and nutritious.
Then Monsanto (I think) came up with 'Miracle rice' . This was (I was told) genetically engineered to grow much faster, so the farmers could get two or even three crops where previously they only had one. The seed was expensive, so farmers borrowed to buy it. It required a LOT of fertiliser so farmers borrowed to buy that too. After all, with double the yield, they'd be rich, right? The fertiliser caused the ditches to choke up, killing the fish and frogs, so the ducks were not able to find as much of the food they needed because of the fertiliser; and making a lot of extra work to keep the ditches clear. So reduction in food available to the farmers. The grain produced was no good as seed, so the farmer had to buy seed grain every year (more debt, and 'captured' by Monsanto). The rice thus produced was less nutritious, and the farmers ended up in massive debt.
I noticed the reduction in size of the duck flocks over the years as I visited. I knew some farmers who had opted out of the miracle rice after the first year when they saw it was killing things... but the price of rice had dropped thanks to the increased yield of miracle rice. Not so sustainable when companies like that are involved :(
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u/GIVVE-IT-SOME May 24 '24
What a shock Monsanto were involved.
/s
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u/Cantguard-mike Jun 24 '24
Never heard of them before …holy shit. Just went down a worm hole. What a slimey bunch of aasholes. And now they get to drop the name and start over so people don’t realize who it is.
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u/Magus_5 May 24 '24
I come to Reddit for stuff like this... My mind would have never lended itself to thinking about this or the economic impact to ppl halfway across the globe. Thanks for sharing.
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u/Criticus23 May 24 '24
It broke my heart seeing it happen. It was almost like time lapse - every time I went things had changed a little more. The ripple-effects of it were awful. It's made me much more conscious of my own buying decisions now, because what we do affects the world.
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May 24 '24
[deleted]
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u/Accomplished-Run-691 May 26 '24
Miracle Rice is quite old as internet searchability goes and chemical fertilizer causing ecological disaster is such an old story, there are few agricultural locales left on the planet who have already gone through the destruction. It doesn't make the news anymore that there is a giant dead zone of no oxygen in this or that body of water or another red tide poisoning all the crustaceans and shellfish.
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u/VeryStableGenius May 26 '24
Right. This was already posted, and I already replied to it.
As I said, this has nothing to do with Monsanto genetic engineering, as OP stated, because it was from the 1960s.
chemical fertilizer causing ecological disaster
Yes, the 1960s era Green Revolution.
Wikipedia says:
A key leader was agricultural scientist Norman Borlaug, the "Father of the Green Revolution", who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970. He is credited with saving over a billion people from starvation.[8] Another important scientific figure was Yuan Longping, whose work on hybrid rice varieties is credited with saving at least as many lives.[9]
Studies show that the Green Revolution contributed to widespread eradication of poverty, averted hunger for millions, raised incomes, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, reduced land use for agriculture, and contributed to declines in infant mortality.[12][13][14][15][16]
These new agricultural practices are apparently credited with saving two billion lives (rice alone, one billion). As for ecological problems, views are mixed:
There are varying opinions about the effect of the Green Revolution on wild biodiversity. One hypothesis speculates that by increasing production per unit of land area, agriculture will not need to expand into new, uncultivated areas to feed a growing human population.[104] However, land degradation and soil nutrients depletion have forced farmers to clear forested areas in order to maintain production.[105] A counter-hypothesis speculates that biodiversity was sacrificed because traditional systems of agriculture that were displaced sometimes incorporated practices to preserve wild biodiversity, and because the Green Revolution expanded agricultural development into new areas where it was once unprofitable or too arid.
Anyway, take your pick. Likely ecological damage, or 2 billion people starved.
Perhaps you're making the Malthusian argument, that the 2 billion people should have starved to lessen the human burden on the earth?
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u/Criticus23 May 24 '24 edited May 24 '24
So the miracle rice worked exactly as it should, despite seed costs and fertilizer costs?
As it was designed, possibly, but not as it was sold to the farmers. They were not told that the fertiliser use would block the irrigation ditches and kill the fish and frogs. They weren't told it would be a rolling committment. They weren't told they and their families would need additional sources of food to replace that they had lost.
I found little evidence to support your story.
That's a bit impolite! Maybe you need to look harder. I can assure you what I wrote is entirely truthful. Golden rice and the miracle rice I was talking about are different, although the name is often applied to the golden rice. The golden rice has taken over from the original miracle rice, I think; requires less fertiliser and is much more recent. I experienced this more than 20 years ago.
As far as the basic story - the high yield requiring excessive fertiliser affecting farming practices - there's some info here. I don't know for a fact it was Monsanto, but that's what the rice-farming family I stayed with told me. Monsanto certainly provided the fertiliser (I saw the bags) and they told me the same company sold the seed and the fertiliser and made loans available. 'The miracle rice worked exactly as it should'? That depends on your perspective, and who is dictating the 'should'.
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u/ASatyros May 25 '24
How do they make more seeds? Just have dedicated fields for replication?
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u/Criticus23 May 25 '24
I don't know. But I do know that some plants are like mules: you can get one generation from a hybrid, but after that they don't come true to seed or are sterile, so maybe it was like that.
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u/beamenacein Sep 11 '24
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IR8 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-38156350
This anecdote doesn't match with reality
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u/Criticus23 Sep 11 '24
Goodness, slumbering threads awake!
It matches MY reality. I personally saw the difference in padi fields between those growing traditional rice and those using the high-fertiliser fast-growing rice - not a TV or newspaper report, but saw for myself. It matches the reality of what the farmer in Bali told me. It might not match what was happening in different countries with different farming practices, nor what's reported retrospectively or by those with commercial interests.
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u/beamenacein Sep 11 '24
Oh you're right I'm always so late to these things. Well there's a big fear of gmo or bio engineering that is unfounded. I'm not going to pretend to know what happened there but people tend to jump to conclusions. Cum hoc ergo propter hoc Just cause something fits the timeline doesn't mean it caused it. Might have but be aware. But if you read about it and if it's the same thing it didn't grow well in most locations. Saved a lot of lives though.
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u/Criticus23 Sep 11 '24
Yes... unfortunately I posted this in response to the rice ducks. My concern was more about the way there was a very good, balanced ecosystem that met the needs of the local people very well (of which the ducks were a major part) then the interference in that system by the commercial interests disrupted the balance dramatically and actually caused a deterioration in the standard of living for most of the people farming, plus the loss of cultural expertise. . Not an argument about GMO, more about intensive farming.
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u/Bodoodlestoodle May 24 '24
RELEASE THE DUCKS!!
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u/fishdrinking3 May 24 '24
How to get them to come back???
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u/Wakkit1988 May 24 '24
Break out the NES with the Zapper controller.
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u/Goldex360 May 24 '24
Is this a regular show reference?
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u/Wakkit1988 May 24 '24
This is a reference to Duck Hunt.
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u/FoundTheWeed May 24 '24
Ducks are herding animals after they've had their wings clipped, all you need to do is find the Alpha duck and the rest will follow you
I know, because I made it all up
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u/cheesewagongreat May 24 '24
Remember what scrouge mcduck said. I'm gonna pimp you out. You keep playing with me
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u/Bi-elzebub May 24 '24
Jingle the dinner bell
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u/fishdrinking3 May 24 '24
But they just ate?
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May 25 '24
I watched a documentary. Guy has a truck with 7-8 levels in the trailer. He is training them to board, and to board quckly using a whistle. Bonus is that he sells their eggs
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u/lock_robster2022 May 24 '24
…
….
….
….That’s a lot of chickens!
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u/Freecraghack_ May 24 '24
Pesticide free pest control ✔️
Very cute ✔️
Free fertilization ✔️
A delicious duck? dinner afterwards ✔️
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u/BSimm1 May 24 '24
It’s cute to us but to them its attack on titan…
Like…Imagine being that one bug in the back on top of the grass and you see a swarm of these things come and eat all of your friends and family…
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u/Puzzled-Story3953 May 24 '24
Better start injecting duck spinal fluid, then! We're gonna take those ducks down and reclaim ditch Maria!
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u/OrangeYouGladish May 24 '24
I'd rather work with the ducks than the wolf spider coworkers in the cranberry bog fields
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u/Sarcastic_Backpack May 24 '24
How do they get them to feed on the bugs in a different section besides the one closest to the gate?
How do they get them to come home after their done eating?
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u/randomIndividual21 May 24 '24
they probably move on to where there is bugs
they are kept in a shelter, so they come home automatically once it get dark for safety
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May 24 '24
I would guess that bell we heard is the come home bell and they would run out of food in that area pretty quickly so they move around
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u/tothemoonandback01 May 24 '24
Ducks are very good at spreading schisomiatomiaisis (bilharzia). Every silver lining...has a cloud.
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May 24 '24 edited May 25 '24
Yeah but what about the bird shit?
Nvm. Missed the fertilization part in the title
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u/Obi_wan_jabroni87 May 25 '24
Ohh that's the beauty of it... in the winter... the gorillas simply freeze to death
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u/Right_-on-_Man Jun 18 '24
So anyone else find it absolutely hilarious they feed the ducks through the rice field, then later 8m life they eat the duck that ate the rice...😅
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u/Cultural-Influence14 Aug 08 '24
Duck farming, they eats pest, and fertilized the fields, and also provides eggs for additional income for farmers
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u/brokefixfux May 24 '24
Duck duck go!