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takyon writes:

Chinese scientists put rice grown in seawater on the nation's tables

Rice grown on a commercial scale in diluted seawater has, for the first time, made it into the rice bowls of ordinary Chinese people after a breakthrough in food production following more than four decades of efforts by farmers, researchers, government agencies and businesses.

[...] China has one million square kilometres of waste land, an area the size of Ethiopia, where plants struggle to grow because of high salinity or alkalinity levels in the soil. Agricultural scientist Yuan Longping, known as China's "father of hybrid rice", told mainland media that if a tenth of such areas were planted with rice species resistant to salt, they could boost China's rice production by nearly 20 per cent. They could produce 50 million tonnes of food, enough to feed 200 million people, he said. A research team led by Yuan, 87, recently doubled the output of seawater rice, which in the past was too low for large-scale production.

[...] Last month, at the nation's largest seawater rice farm, in Qingdao, the output of Yuan's seawater rice exceeded 4.5 tonnes a hectare, according to state media reports. [...] Each kilogram of "Yuan Mi" costs 50 yuan (US$7.50), or eight times as much as ordinary rice. It is sold in packs weighing 1kg, 2kg, 5kg and 10kg.

[...] The seawater rice developed by Yuan and other research teams is not irrigated by pure seawater, but mixes it with fresh water to reduce the salt content to 6 grams per litre. The average litre of seawater contains five times as much salt. Researchers said it would take years more research to develop a rice species that could grow in pure seawater.

Professor Zhu Xiyue, an economics and policy expert at the national rice institute, said the seawater rice project would help secure China's food supply by turning "waste land to green fields". "The output may be low and price high, but they can increase China's total area of arable land, which can be used and save many lives in hard times," Zhou said.

Related: Where's the Golden Rice?

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