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Study on water management and quality in paddy field at IRRI
Satomi Tabata 
International and Environmental Agricultural Science
Tokyo University of agriculture and technology
Host Organization: International Rice Research Institute
Destination and period: Philippines, One month
Key words: International institute, Azolla, Water quality
1. International Rice Research Institute
International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is an international independent research and training organization with headquarters in Philippines and offices in sixteen countries. It is also the largest non-profit agricultural research center in Asia. Their mission is to reduce poverty and hunger, improve the health of rice farmers and consumers, and ensure environmental sustainability. As known for its contribution to Green Revolution, IRRI has worked on food shortage problems. Green Revolution refers to a series of research, development, and technology transfer initiatives, occurring between the 1940s and the late 1960s, that increased agriculture production worldwide, particularly in the developing countries. Specifically, they had worked on the development of high-yielding varieties of cereal grains, expansion of irrigation infrastructure, modernization of management techniques, distribution of hybridized seeds, synthetic fertilizers, and pesticides to farmers. Now they promote Golden Rice.
I had belonged to Crop and Environmental Science Division, which conducts researches related to climate change. Climate change is a serious issue for rice production, as farmers will not be able to grow rice under the different climate condition in the future. My laboratory in IRRI works on the field of soil science and Azolla bank. Azolla is a floating plant which has been used as green manure for paddy field in Asian countries including Japan since it contains high amount of nitrogen. There are more than five hundreds species and IRRI has played a role as the Azolla bank. They basically culture and keep the species, and offer them when they receive requests from other institutes.
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| Fig. 1 Laboratory members | Fig. 2 Azolla house | Fig. 3 Azolla |
2. Activities during the internship
My boss set me to a task about Azolla culture. Presently, one technician has been in charge of it, however he does not really record the characteristics of each species of Azollas. Therefore, my experiment was to reveal the reactions of each Azolla species to water quality such as different pH and EC levels. By figuring out these relationships, the better culturing way of Azolla could be found. Moreover, the amount of time and labor which technicians have to make will be reduced. I had learned that it is one of the important factors when it comes to organizations, because they do not want to waste expense on employment cost. Efficiency is the key word.
Thus, I had experiments of Azolla and water quality relationships. I had been told to conduct this experiment by myself beforehand, so I created protocol for the experiment and executed it with the technician. At last I proposed a better culture equipment to my boss; I was able to bring some results to the laboratory. I succeed to record relationship between Azolla and water quality. This is very meaningful because technician has not done this. Once he quits job, there will be nothing about Azolla data. Moreover, I proposed concrete idea for the better culture system. This new system was created to save time of Azolla care. Basically, I proposed new container which can store about eighty species at the same time, which will reduce technician’s labor.
I also attended their group meeting and IRRI weekly seminar. I was able to observe how people work in international organization. Although each of them has different nationality and background, they can cooperate well thanks to the solid contacts. For example, workers weekly evaluate themselves and give a short report at the meeting so that they can share how each project is going on. In addition, the efficiency of their working style is checked. I realized how important the feedback and information sharing are. Moreover, by self-evaluation, they can motivate themselves.
3. My thoughts and ideas about environmental leadership and future vision based on the internship experience
There are several points I have realized and learned by this internship. To begin with, I was surprised at how feudalistic organization system is. There are clear positions such as international researcher, national researcher, technicianⅠ,Ⅱ,Ⅲ, and contract workers. Jobs are divided into several steps, and every one of them focuses on only their own works. For instance, contract workers do not even take phone call, but technician can take it. To be honest, I was not so comfortable with this system at first, because we do not usually work in that way in Japan. Although there are positions, we are to respect older people even if they are subordinate. I cannot still made decision which way is better, but it is obviously important to get accustomed to this different type of system. According to Japanese stuff in IRRI who have abundant working experience in the field of international cooperation, Japanese tend to be described as bad at using his or her followers. They do not feel comfortable driving someone, and this is why it makes difficult for them to have a strong presence in the field when they work with foreigners. Although I, from Japanese perspective, do not think Japanese way is inappropriate, I always consider we should appeal more what we have done in our work to others. Moreover, it is necessary to make strong bond with co-workers as in Japan we often try to do, so that we can understand each other's hard work.
Next, attending some seminars held by IRRI made me think the importance to know what the problems are in the country or region. Subconsciously I had a focus on quality of food rather than quantity before I visited Philippines. Japan no longer has issues with the amount of food; people care more about quality and taste. I knew there are people who are starving in the other side of world, but I did not think it is also issue in Philippines. I guess this is the typical example that you will not perfectly understand the problems unless you actually visit there. Thus, I have learned that it is crucial to always try to study what the problems are in the field.
Third, meeting a lot of researchers and interns gave me an actual sense of an international worker. It was quite exciting to talk with many people who have various back ground and face a problem together to solve it. One of the best gains from this internship is that I was able to feel the atmosphere of an international institute. Basically they have different work styles based on their life style. Some work very hard even they kill their weekends, others work at coffee shop and take their private time. However the important thing is output. They usually make three or five years contracts with IRRI so they are evaluated on what they have done at the end, therefore they have to obtain good results. Moreover, not everybody stays at IRRI for a long period. They seek other job opportunities for their careers. In other words, working at an international organization is not very stable unlike working for Japanese private companies. On the flip side, people can get chance to experience by working for different institutes or companies, and make use of them to develop their career. Once you obtain solid skills, it does not seem to be difficult to find a new job. That is why almost everyone who are in IRRI as international researchers have PhD.
Finally, I have found out what to do for my future through this internship. I guess my command of English is good enough but it will be better to have the third fluent language such as French or Spanish. I was so happy about that people were surprised at my English skill, but at the same time I was sad about it because the reputation of Japanese English is lower than the world standard. I see many Japanese people speak English well in my generation, but it will not be applied to Japanese whole society.
Also, making connection with those who work for international institutes is genuinely important to get a job. However, the bigger an institute becomes, the less it can give an impact on the local scale. For example, FAO is struggling with making effective and large impact on local societies by their projects. I heard this when I luckily attended their workshop while I was in Philippines. On the other hand, IRRI is able to do that since they are specifically working on local levels, which is their advantage. In that case, it will be essential to be able to communicate very well with local people.
Thus, I would say what I need to do for my future is to try to develop my third language skill, get more working experiences, and get to know people. The reason why I think working experience is the key is that international organizations tend to evaluate on experiences. Since I am not fascinated by proceeding PhD straight after getting master degree, I would like to get as much experiences as I can in private companies. I hope that I can be a field oriented leader in the future.