2004年,袁隆平院士获得世界粮食大奖。特节选当时外媒报道内容,以纪念这位为世界粮食安全作出卓越贡献的英雄。
Scientists from China and Sierra Leone are the winners of this year's World Food Prize. Chinese Professor Yuan Longping and Monty Jones will share the two-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar prize. Both men are being honored for work they did to improve rice production in developing countries. Two-thousand-four is the International Year of Rice.
Professor Yuan is head of the National Hybrid Rice Research and Development Center in Hunan, China. He received his share of the prize for work he did in the nineteen-seventies.
Mister Yuan developed ways to genetically combine different kinds of rice to increase production. He discovered that combining two kinds of rice results in a better, more productive new rice. He established the hybrid rice seed industry in China. He also shared research and helped train scientists from more than twenty-five countries. For his efforts, Mister Yuan is called the "Father of Hybrid Rice."