Abdelbagi Ismail, IRRI representative for Eastern and Southern Africa received the prestigious Fellowship of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, India as a foreign fellow. The fellowship was bestowed upon Dr. Ismail in recognition of his outstanding contributions to understanding tolerance of drought, cold, and heat in dry-land crops, as well as for salinity and different types of flooding stresses in rice. He also contributed to developing phenotyping tools, markers, and varieties which generated significant impacts in South and Southeast Asia, and in Sub-Saharan Africa.

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Lawrence Uy, a researcher at IRRI’s Genetic Transformation Laboratory, received the award for best scientific poster presentation at the 6th Plant Genomics and Gene Editing Congress Asia in Malaysia in July 2019. The poster, Gn1a and TGW6 Targeted Knock-Down via Genome Editing Increases Yield Components in Samba Mahsuri, featured research on how grain number and grain weight can be significantly improved through targeted knock-down of gene regulators using CRISPR-Cpf1. 
 
Also acknowledged were Mr. Uy’s co-authors Drs. Yvonne Ludwig and Inez Slamet-Loedin from IRRI and Drs. Merlyn Mendiolo, Ma. Carmina Manuel, and Jorge Angeles from the University of the Philippines.

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Myanmar’s Department of Agricultural Research acknowledged IRRI’s valued partnership and contributions to the country’s agriculture sector during its 65th anniversary celebration.
 
IRRI and Myanmar have been collaborating on rice research for more than half a century, beginning with the 1967 introduction of the high-yielding IR8 rice variety (locally known as Yar Gyaw). Recent key achievements include the development of the Myanmar Rice Sector Development Strategy and Climate-Smart Agriculture Strategy, the release of 81 IRRI rice varieties, the dissemination of post-harvest technologies and best crop management practices, and building institutional capacity.

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