He is a real food hero!Foreign media collectively swipe the screen to mourn Yuan Longping

◎ Zhang Jiaxin, reporter of Science and Technology Daily
On May 22, the “father of hybrid rice” Yuan Longping passed away. The international community expressed great concern, and many foreign media reported immediately.

The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs tweeted: “Today, we cherish the memory of a true food hero. Chinese scientist Yuan Longping has freed millions of people from hunger by breeding the first hybrid rice variety. He died today, at the end of the year. 91 years old, but his legacy and mission to end hunger will continue.” Singapore’s South China Morning Post published a report entitled “People pay tribute to Yuan Longping who helped China get rid of hunger”, and mentioned that the United Nations praised Yuan Longping for his contribution to food security and poverty eradication. Japan’s “Nikkei Asian Review” issued an obituary for Yuan Longping. The article stated that for more than half a century, Yuan Longping has been committed to the research and development of rice breeding in order to increase food production and has made great contributions to solving China’s food problems. The “New York Times” published a long article reviewing Yuan Longping’s life, saying that “the high-yield hybrid rice he developed in the 1970s has greatly increased the output of Asia and Africa and saved countless lives.” “Yuan Longping’s research has made him A national hero, he is also a symbol of China’s pursuit of science.” The Associated Press reported that Yuan Longping and his team have cooperated with dozens of countries and regions around the world to solve the problems of food security and malnutrition. The hybrid rice developed by Yuan Longping “helped feed our world”. The Associated Press also reported on Yuan Longping’s contributions in his later years. “Even in his later years, Yuan Longping did not stop researching. In 2017, he cooperated with the Hunan Academy of Agricultural Sciences to cultivate a low-cadmium indica rice for areas suffering from heavy metal pollution. , Which reduced the cadmium content in rice by more than 90%.” The British “Independent” stated: “The high-yield rice varieties he developed have helped feed people all over the world.” The “Independent” also cited information from the World Food Awards, the highest international honor in the field of agriculture, as Yuan Longping’s The work helped China realize the transition from food shortage to food security within 30 years. The German “Daily News” praised Yuan Longping and said: “Ensuring that people all over the world can eat has been Yuan Longping’s main goal for decades. In China, this goal has been basically achieved, and now the agricultural scientist who died at the age of 91 The research done has made a significant contribution to this. Since the early 1970s, the special rice varieties cultivated by Yuan and his research team have significantly improved food yields.” The “Daily News” also mentioned that in 2018, Yuan Longping said in an interview with German Television One (ARD) that all of this stemmed from his “dream of enjoying the cool under the sun”. He told reporters: “In this dream, We saw huge rice, the ears were as luxuriant as a broom, and the rice grains were as big as peanuts. We lay under these huge straws to enjoy the cool.” According to the report, by the early 1970s, most biologists in the world He agronomist believes that hybrid rice breeding is not feasible. But Yuan Longping used his research to prove to the world that it can be successful, and became a scientific hero in China because of hybrid rice. Source: Science and Technology Daily