International Rice Research Institute (IRRI)  

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The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is an autonomous, nonprofit agricultural research and training organization with offices in more than ten nations. The Institute’s main goal is to find sustainable ways to improve the well-being of present and future generations of poor rice farmers and consumers while at the same time protecting the environment. Most of IRRI’s research is done in cooperation with national agricultural research and development institutions, farming communities, and other organizations of the world’s rice- producing nations.IRRI was established in 1960 by the Ford and Rockefeller foundations in cooperation with the government of the Philippines. Its research activities began in 1962 and are now estimated to have touched the lives of almost half the world’s population. The Institute’s research headquarters has laboratories and training facilities on a 252-hectare experimental farm on the main campus of the University of the Philippines Los Baños, about 60 kilometers south of the Philippine capital, Manila. Besides doing rice research, IRRI is also very active in local communities—providing educational scholarships, organizing income-generating training activities, and arranging other community projects that will help improve living conditions in the poor communities that neighbor the Institute. To learn more about IRRI and its activities visit the Institute’s web site at http://www.irri.org.