ABSTRACT
Rice is an ancient grain, the beginnings of its culture seemingly lost in prehistory. It is the staple food of approximately half of mankind. Although the global production of wheat is greater than that of rice, about one-fourth of the wheat crop is used for nonfood purposes compared with only 7 percent of the rice crop. Except of course for Antarctica, every continent on the planet produces rice. In Africa, Egypt and Madagascar alone accounted for 60 percent of the rice production during the 1971-1975 period. In the United States (US), Europe, and Australia, 100 percent of the rice crop is irrigated, adequate quantities of fertilizer are applied, and good farming practices prevail. For 1976, the US Department of Agriculture placed the Soviet rice crop at 2.2 million tons and the area sown to rice at 522,000 hectares. The apparent average annual consumption of rice for the principal rice-consuming countries of Asia is mostly over 100 kilograms a person.
