Dr. Franz Lennartz Visited the Rice Research Institute of Sri Lanka

Dr. Franz was invited by K.G. Sriyapala the director General of Agriculture, Ministry of Agriculture, Sri Lanka to visit the Rice Research Institute from the 4th to the 6th of July 2013 . This invitation resulted from previous contacts between Dr. Franz Lennartz and the Rice Research and Development Institute of Sri Lanka (RRDI), which are based on common research interests in the field of dry rice production.

During his visit, he presented some of his work on the field of water saving irrigations scheduling and control to the community of researchers of the RRDI, which generated a very good discussions on the use of model based approaches for water saving irrigation scheduling and control in dry rice production.
Dr. Franz visited irrigation schemes of the wet and intermediate zone of Sri Lanka. This field trip showed the hydrologic problems of the rice production on a large scale. Even though there is in general enough rainfall for two harvests the uneven rainfall distribution demands a large storage volume. Because the densely populated regions do not allow for the construction of additional storage reservoirs, dry rice productions offers a way out of the dilemma.