To mark the renowned academician and “father of hybrid rice” Yuan Longping, on May 22, the inauguration and unveiling ceremony of a bronze statue in his likeness was held in the newly-built Yuan Longping Memorial Park in Sanya Paddy Field National Park.

The bronze statue of Yuan Longping. [Photo/IC]
The total height of the bronze statue is 5.22 meters. In the bronze statue, Yuan is wearing a short-sleeved shirt and a pair of rain boots. He is holding a straw hat in his right hand and a handful of rice ears in his left hand. Around the bronze statue are newly sown seedlings.

This bronze statue was completed in three months in Beijing by Wu Weishan, a famous sculptor and artist, as well as director of the National Art Museum of China.

Yuan is an honorary citizen of Sanya. He spent almost every winter at the city’s Nanfan base for 53 years from 1968 to 2021, where he founded the key variety of hybrid rice, wild abortive (WA).

Setting up Yuan’s bronze statue in his second hometown Sanya will better promote and thank Yuan’s great contribution to world food production, as well as publicize the achievements of Sanya Nanfan breeding to the public, said Ke Yongchun, director of the Sanya municipal bureau of agriculture and rural affairs.