THE International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Los Baños, Laguna announced a path-breaking research project that aims to develop—invent is more apt—a rice variety that needs less water and fertilizer but yields 50-percent more grain than the best present-day varieties. [...] It will take three years to prove the concept and 15 years to have a ”functioning C4 rice” to quote Achin Dobermann, the deputy director general for research of IRRI.