Chinese agricultural scientist Yuan Longping dies at 90

 

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National Icon Yuan Longping Dies at 90

The Chinese scientist Yuan Longping, whose development of hybrid rice in the 1970s helped bring an end to famine for millions of people throughout Asia and Africa, died Saturday at the age of 90. In most of the world, his death was remarked in passing. In China, where Yuan was a national icon, it dominated the news.

Yuan’s early years were marked by war and hunger, as a child during the Japanese invasion and as a young man during the Great Leap Forward (1959-1961), when somewhere between 20 million and 45 million Chinese starved to death. As an agricultural scientist, Yuan crossbred a rice species to produce 20 to 30 percent greater yields than previous strains. His work was part of the Green Revolution that transformed global food supplies and staved off warnings of overpopulation and mass famine in the 1960s and 1970s.

Numerous factors make Yuan a particularly beloved figure in China. He was the first modern scientist working in the country to make a breakthrough with global recognition—without clashing with the politics of the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), when he did his most significant work. Agricultural science was to some degree politically shielded from assaults on universities and scientific institutions. (Yuan’s initial genetic research was conducted in secrecy since Mendelian theory was politically anathema.)

Yuan was a personally modest man with a deep commitment to young scientists. He resisted being turned into a propaganda figure as best he could. His death sparked widespread mourning, especially in his home city of Changsha, Hunan province. It also prompted the authorities to arrest several people for posting insulting comments about him online.

China owes much to Yuan, whose work helped bring the country out of the persistent food insecurity that reached its nadir in the 19th and 20th centuries, thanks to overpopulation, political collapse, and ecological disaster. Malnutrition remained the norm in many parts of China throughout the 1970s, and food rationing only officially ended in 1993. Even today, the first central government document issued every year still concerns China’s food supply.