12 November 2021 – The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice), through the Water-efficient and risk-mitigation technologies for enhancing rice production in irrigated and rainfed environments (WateRice) project with the support of the Philippine Department of Agriculture (DA) – Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR), conducted a virtual webinar on laser land leveling and mechanical transplanting on Zoom.
Increasing rice production efficiency is one of the main goals of the WateRice project, which aims to improve farmers’ well-being by increasing their incomes through sustainably intensified rice production systems that are responsive to climate change impacts, are equipped with appropriate technologies, and that produce high quality rice for the market.
Geared towards providing stakeholders a better appreciation of these technologies and their role in increasing production efficiency, the webinar gathered over 300 attendees from different parts of the Philippines and other countries.
Senator Cynthia Villar, Chairperson, Philippine Senate Committee on Agriculture, Food, and Agrarian Reform shared a message appreciating this initiative and encouraging all stakeholders to continue efforts in making farming technologies accessible to smallholder farmers.
“These kinds of webinars which highlight innovative technologies, which are not only applicable in the rice industry, but also to the agricultural industry in general, are very important. These pieces of information also assist us legislators towards our insight to include in our bills these newly introduced technologies for the benefit of our farmers,” she said.
Laser land leveling and mechanical transplanting
Since its introduction in 1997, laser land leveling (LLL) has helped farmers improve their rice production. LLL is a precision technology on field leveling introduced by IRRI in collaboration with Trimble (then Spectra Precision) to stabilize rice production and improve efficiency in field operations.
Meanwhile, mechanical transplanting is a practice that has also…