Progress and challenges of rice ratooning technology in Hubei Province, China

Rice ratooning is gaining more attentions in China because it helps cope with several challenges in rice production, such as food security, labor shortage, low economic benefits and climate change. Hubei Province which is located in the middle reaches of Yangtze River valley is one of the important regions for ratoon rice with a planting area of 213,000 ​ha in recent years, and has made significant progresses in physiological and agronomic studies of ratoon rice. Especially in last decade, the establishment and dissemination of mechanized ratooning rice system was initiated in Hubei. Currently, the average ratoon crop and annual yields of mechanized ratooning rice system could exceed 5.25 and 15.00 ​t ​ha⁻¹, respectively, in farmers’ ​field using cultivars such as Fengliangyouxiang1, Liangyou6326 and Yongyou4949 in major ratoon rice growing counties such as Honghu, Qichun and Shayang. In the present review, we summarized the development course of ratoon rice in Hubei with respect to the government policy support, planting area, variety selection, management practices and physiological studies.