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Article: Rice work if you can get it: green farming.
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- March 21, 1992
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1992 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A NEW variety of Californian farmer aims to be green, high-tech, and profitable all at the same time. PureHarvest Corporation, a privately owned firm based in Napa, has devised a way of growing rice in the Sacramento Valley that uses 25% less water, no herbicides and pesticides, and some clever machinery, which it licenses out to farmers. As California enters its fifth year of drought, and Californians become more and more worried about the chemicals tainting their meagre streams and ground water, smiles at PureHarvest get wider.
About 7,000 years ago, rice farmers started to flood their fields. Rice can pump oxygen from its leaves to its roots, so it copes with the ...