Submitted to: American Association of Cereal Chemists Meetings
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: June 12, 2000
Publication Date: N/A
Technical Abstract: There is growing domestic and international demand for crops produced using organic cultural management (OCM). In the U.S., rice is being produced under organic conditions in both California and the Southern U.S. rice growing areas. As demand for organically produced rice has grown, germplasm that has high yield potential and desirable end-use quality characteristics when grown using OCM is being sought. Several Indica rice lines have been identified that appear to offer a yield advantage when grown under organic conditions. The effect of OCM on the milling quality of Indica or U.S. rice germplasm is not known. An experiment grown in 1999 in Beaumont, TX, compared the effects of OCM to standard cultural practices on rice milling quality. Several Indica lines were grown in four replicated plots in Beaumont, TX, in 1999, using OCM as well as conventional management (CM) using a lower (100 lb/ac) and a higher (200 lb/ac) amount of N (100N and 200N). A conventional U.S. long grain, Cypress, and a U.S. aromatic rice, Jasmine 85, were also studied. Our preliminary results are that cultural management did not effect total milling yields. Lower N and OCM treatments resulted in lower whole rice milling yields but a greater degree of whiteness compared to that of a higher N treatment. There is evidence that some consumers prefer whiter milled rice. The effects of OCM on milling quality will be verified using data from an additional year. Our future efforts in this area include identifying cultivars whose whole milling yields are not negatively impacted by OCM.