THE country yesterday morning held a memorial service to bid farewell to Yuan Longping, known as the “Father of Hybrid Rice,” who passed away Saturday.

Despite being a busy work day, thousands of people dressed in black showed up and laid flowers at the site before the service began at 10 a.m. in Changsha, capital of Central China’s Hunan Province.

The agronomist helped China work a great wonder — feeding nearly one-fifth of the world’s population with less than 9 percent of the world’s total arable land.

He is deeply respected in China, where getting enough to eat was once a serious problem. In 2019, Yuan was awarded the Medal of the Republic, China’s highest State honor.

The influx of mourners created a traffic gridlock miles long yesterday morning, prompting many to descend from their vehicles to walk to the memorial site inside a mortuary house. Some mourners arrived by train from other cities to “see Grandpa Yuan for the last time.”

“People from outside Hunan are coming to bid him farewell,” said Liu Haohui, one of the taxi drivers who offered free rides to the mourners. “As a local taxi driver, we hope to do something to pay tribute to Yuan.”

Also among the huge crowd of mourners were couriers holding flowers that they said were ordered by distant buyers.

Many florists in Changsha told Xinhua that their chrysanthemums had sold out.

“Online orders kept flowing in. We worked overnight to prepare the flowers but still couldn’t meet the demand,” said florist Tan Lijuan.

Yuan began his pioneering research on hybrid rice in 1964. After nine years of painstaking research and testing, his team successfully cultivated the hybrid-rice strain in 1973. Yuan spent the next four decades improving hybrid rice, which has now progressed to its third generation.

“We traveled all the way here to see him off. We farmers owe him gratitude,” said Zhou Xiuying, 70, inside the memorial hall.

“We must thank him for bringing us food,” a woman was seen telling her young child at the site.

Foreign scientists and media also paid tribute to Yuan.

According to Giovanni Zollo, an agricultural researcher specializing in rice at the University of Verona in northern Italy, Yuan’s research helped set the stage for big steps forward in rice research, creating benefits not only in Yuan’s native China, but also globally.

“Rice producers around the world owe a debt of gratitude to Yuan Longping,” Zollo told Xinhua. “He was a pioneer.”

AGI, an Italian news service, praised Yuan’s work for “helping feed millions of people in China,” while Riso Italiano — a news site focused on the country’s rice industry — referred to him as “the supreme Chinese rice scientist.”

Ram Chandra Adhikari, director for planning and coordination at the Nepal Agricultural Research Council, met with Yuan in 2016 during a week-long training program in Changsha.

Adhikari was impressed with Yuan being “a simple person despite his fame.”

“I remember him saying to us that China’s food security would be at stake without hybrid rice, while suggesting Nepal adopting hybrid rice for its own food security.” (Xinhua)