With the preponderance of news regarding the coronavirus dominating the headlines, the passing of one of the best professionals in the field of agriculture is easily passed over. However, Federico Cuevas Perez, who suffered a heart attack in Houston, Texas, was an internationally well-noted plant geneticist the results of whose work is probably in the kitchens of those who read this.
Cuevas Pérez was the head of the Dominican Rice Institute in Bonao, and the varieties of rice harvested here are his work. He was the head of Bioarroz, headquartered in the Yin Tieh Hsieh Hsu Experimental Rice Laboratory there in Bonao and the Monseñor Nouel province. This is an institute that for 50 years was run in collaboration with the government of Taiwan and originally led by Dr. Hsieh.
The Dominican Republic became self-sufficient in rice, due in very large part to the efforts of the Institute. Cuevas, in addition to the current rice varieties, has left 10 more in the initial stages of production.
A graduate of the Instituto Superior de Agricultura (ISA, and now Universidad ISA), he doctored in plant genetics at Oregon State University in 1981, and wrote his dissertation at the world famous Rockefeller Rice Institute in the Philippines, now known as the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI).
Speaking Mandarin, French, Italian and German, as well as English, Cuevas oversaw rice production throughout Latin America for seven years at the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture in Cali, Colombia. He traveled extensively to China as well as Taiwan and Southeast Asia, compiling a database that is in wide use today.
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El Caribe
13 April 2020