1. It grows from the tropics to subtropical and warm temperate countries upto 400S and
500N of the equator.

2. Most of the rice area lies between equator and 400N and 700 to 1400 EL. Highest yields were recorded between 300 and 45o N of the equator.

3. India, China and Egypt lying between 210 to 300 N, the average yield ranges from 2.0 to 5.7 t/ha. The countries near the equator shows an average yield of 0.8 to 1.4 t/h.

1. It is the staple food crop for more than 60% of the world people.

2. In other countries attractive ready to eat products, which have, long shelf life eg. popped and puffed rice, instant or rice flakes, canned rice and fermented products are produced.

3. Protein is present in aleuron and endosperm 6 to 9% and average is 7.5%.

4. Rice straw is used as cattle feed, used for thatching roof and in cottage industry for preparation of hats, mats, ropes, sound absorbing straw board and used as litter material.

5. Rice husk is used as animal feed, for paper making, as fuel source.

Rice belongs to genus Oryza and family Poaceae. The genus includes 24 species of which
O. sativa and O. glaberrima are cultivated. O. sativa has three sub species viz; Indica, Japonica
and Javanica.

1. Indica: Indigenous to India is adapted to subtropical to tropical regions. In India, the
varieties are very tall, photosensitive, lodging poor fertilizer response and moderate filling.
They are late maturing. The morphological differences between the varieties are very wide
and awn less.

2. Japanica: It is confined to subtropical temperate region (Japan, China, Korea). Varieties are

1. The Hybrid Rice program in India was launched in 1989, through a systematic, goal oriented and time bound network project with the financial assistance from Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).

2. Technical support from the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Philippines and the FAO, Rome and additional financial support from the UNDP, ICAR and NATP and Barwale Foundation were the major contributing factors for the remarkable success of hybrid rice technology in India.

1. Rice breeding programme in India was started by Dr. G. P. Hector, the then Economic Botanist during 1911 in undivided Bengal with headquarters at Dacca (now in Bangladesh). Subsequently, in 1912, a crop specialist was appointed exclusively for rice in Madras Province.

1. Historians believe that while the indica variety of rice was first domesticated in the area covering the foothills of the Eastern Himalayas (i.e. north-eastern India), stretching through Burma, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Southern China, the japonica variety was domesticated from wild rice in southern China which was introduced to India before the time of the Greeks. Chinese records of rice cultivation go back 4000 years.

1. Rice cultivation is the principal activity and source of income for millions of households around the globe, and several countries of Asia and Africa are highly dependent on rice as a source of foreign exchange earnings and government revenue.

2. Rice is the second largest produced cereal in the world. At the beginning of the 1990s, annual production was around 350 million tons and by the end of the century it had reached 410 million tons.

1. Chang (2000) made exhaustive review on the pattern for rice evolution was suggested as from perennial wild to annual wild and then to cultivated. Therefore, the evolution for O. sativa is O. rufipogon to O. nivara to O. sativa in Asia. In parallel, the evolution for O. glaberrima is O. longistaminata to O. barthii and then to O. glaberrima in Africa.

2. It is believed that rice originated in the marsh areas and spread toward the dry lands and hills. The domestication of rice, including such cultural practices as puddling and transplanting, might have first taken place in China.

1. In the beginning rice grew wild, but today most countries cultivate varieties belonging to the Oryza type which has around twenty different species. Only two of them offer an agriculture interest for humans.

2. Oryza sativa: a common Asian rice found in most producing countries which originated in the Far East at the foot of the Himalayas. O. sativa japonica grew on the Chinese side of the mountains and O. sativa indica on the Indian side. The majority of the cultivated varieties belong to this species, which is characterized by its plasticity and taste qualities.