Dr. Monty Jones of Sierra Leone became the first African to receive the prestigious 2004 World Food Prize for his work on the development of New Rice for Africa (NERICA). He shares this year’s prize with Professor Yuan Longping from China, whose work was instrumental in achieving the world’s first high-yielding hybrid rice varieties.

The World Food Prize created in 1986 by Dr. Norman Borlaug, recognizes people who help improve the quality or availability of food throughout the world.
NERICA, a technological breakthrough in Africa, is uniquely adapted to the harsh growing environment and low-input conditions in West Africa. Dr. Jones developed NERICA by successfully crossing the Asian O. sativa with the African O. glaberrima, producing drought and pest resistant, high yielding new rice varieties. With the ability to resist weeds, survive droughts, and thrive on poor soils gained from its African parent, and the trait of higher productivity from its Asian ancestor, NERICA is a crop capable of increasing farmers' harvests by up to 50 percent. It is recognized as having immense potential for food security and poverty alleviation in one of the most impoverished regions in the world.

Dr Jones’ groundbreaking work on the NERICA was carried out at the Africa Rice Centre (WARDA), in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire in the mid-90s, where he worked as the principal rice breeder. WARDA is one of the 16 international research centers sponsored by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) of the World Bank.

His accomplishments are already producing enhanced harvests for thousands and thousands of poor farmers, most of them women, with potential benefit for 20 million farmers in West Africa alone.

Born in Sierra Leone, Monty Jones began his career at the Rice Research station in Sierra Leone, where he worked as a breeder for 13 years. He started his international career with the CGIAR as coordinator of the IITA/USAID Cameroon rice program from 1987 to 1990. In 1991, he moved to WARDA to become its principal breeder, where he developed the world renowned NERICA rice. Currently, he is the Executive Secretary of Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), an umbrella organization forming a coalition of major stakeholders in agricultural research in Africa, and serves as the voice for Africa’s agricultural research for development.

Dr. Jones is a graduate of the University of Sierra Leone and received both his M.Sc. in Plant Genetic Resources (1979) and his Ph.D. in Plant Biology (1983) from the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200411020789.html
http://www.worldfoodprize.org/Laureates/04laureates/jones.htm

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