Participatory Plant Breeding in Lao PDR

In 2000, the Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment (SEARICE), an NGO operating at regional level, and the Agricultural Research Center (ARC) of the National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute (NAFRI) together with the Department of Agriculture in Lao PDR launched a program called Biodiversity Use and Conservation in Asia Program (BUCAP), which later merged with another program called Community Biodiversity Development and Conservation (CBDC), and implemented from 2006-2010. Activities centred around Farmer Field Schools (FFS) on rice breeding, through which farmers co-defined breeding objectives, and together with scientists of the ARC, identified suitable parent materials. Researchers and extension agents were trained as FFS facilitators, while policy makers from local and national levels were consciously involved in all key activities to raise awareness and generate support for the work of farmers on the ground. As a result of the initiative, 55 high performing rice varieties were developed, of which some exhibit adaptation to specific conditions, including tolerance to drought or acid soils; one variety was granted official release in 2018, while others are still going through the same process.