Growth of Food Crops in Asia

Rice is Asia’s leading grain crop in terms of production, total area of cultivation, and social significance. Prob­ably native to the deltas of the great Asian rivers—the Ganga, the Chang Jiang, and the Euphrates—it has been cultivated in China and India since ancient times. Rice was already the staple when early lan­guages were taking shape. The words for rice and food are synonyms in several Asian languages.

Although nearly all Asian nations grow the crop, rice occupies an overwhelmingly
important position in the monsoon lands of southern and eastern Asia. The conti­nent as a whole produces about 91-92 percent of world’s annual production; and five countries—China, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Thailand—account for close to 80 percent of the international production.

Essentially a subsistence crop consumed largely in area of its growth, its world trade is very small, amounting to less than 3 percent of the production. In comparison, about 20 percent of wheat and maize grown enter the world trade.

Environmental and human conditions best suited for the cultivation are: high temperatures averaging 75°F (24°C) or more for the growing period; ample rain­fall (60 to 80 inches/150 to 200 cms) annually, most of which falling during the growing period; clayey loams or clay with silt associated with the deltas and river ba­sins; a level, floodable land; and a plentiful, labor force of farmers skilled in the labor- intensive techniques.

Rice cultivation is an intensely demanding crop requiring much more attention than generally required for other grain crops. Farming activities such as weeding, transplantation, application of green manures, detailed water control, maintenance of irrigation channels, con­struction of water-retaining mud-banks, and terraced slopes are all immensely labo­rious tasks that do not lend themselves easily to modern, mechanized techniques. All these conditions are plentifully avail­able in the densely populated humid and subtropical Asia where farmers are skilled in the labor-intensive farming techniques developed over the centuries.

Primarily a “wet crop,” it is most suited to the flat, flooded deltas and river basins where water requirements are met by the rains in the fields themselves or by natural floods. In the uplands, water is sup­plied to the fields by terracing the sloping lands. The uses of irrigation techniques are the time-honored practices. The hilly areas of Japan, China and the Philippines con­tain some spectacular examples of elaborately terraced rice fields.

World production has grown nearly three times since 1950, from 170 million tons to 520 million tons; the chronically food deficit nations of China and India have increased their output nearly four times during the period. Nine Asian na­tions: China, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Thailand, Vietnam, Myanmar, Japan and the Philippines account for over three- fourths of world’s total output.

Other important producers are North Korea, South Korea, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Ma­laysia. Except for Japan, Asian crop yields are low as compared to those in the U.S. (The other important rice producer and exporter). Per hectare average yield for In­dia, China, Philippines, Indonesia, Japan and the U.S. in kilograms are: 1200, 2400, 1500, 2000, 5000, and 3600 respectively.

China is the world’s leader, producing little over one-third of world’s output. Rice is the dominant crop south of the Qinlin Mountain range which is the most significant line of demarcation in China’s agricultural landscape.

Major area of the production are the lower Huanghe basin, the area between the Qinlin Mountains and the Huanghe basin, and the Sunghua and Liao river basins in Manchuria where topographic, soil and climate conditions are most suitable. India and Bangladesh rank second and fourth in the world, but both chronically deficient in their food grain requirements prior to the mid-1980s, have attained self-sufficiency, thanks to the introduction of high-yielding strains, and techniques associated with the Green Revolution.

In Bangladesh, where condi­tions for growth are ideal (level, flooded plains and delta of the Ganga and Brahmaputra rivers) farmers manage to ob­tain two to three crops a year. India is the second largest producer, producing a little over one-fifth of the world. The major ar­eas of production are the well-watered and alluvial Ganga plains and the West and East Coastal plains.

In East Asia rice maintains supremacy as a staple food grain. The primary produc­tion areas in Japan are along the coastal plains in Honshu, generally south of 38°N and the coastal lands around the Inland Sea in southern Japan. Production has re­mained steady between 10-15 million metric tons since 1950; a slight decrease since 1970 reflected the dietary shifts of the Japanese toward beef and dairy products.

Japan has been an importer of rice, nor­mally importing 7 to 10 million metric tons annually, from Southeast Asian na­tions. Rice is also a dominant crop in the Korean Peninsula. The cultivation was greatly expanded during the Japanese con­trol during the 1930s and 1940s by the reclamation of new areas and the use of better seeds and fertilizers with a view to export it to meet the growing demand.

Rice is the basic food crop of Southeast Asia. Producing between, one-fifth to one-fourth of world production the region accounts for nearly one-half of world’s rice exports. Most of the export goes to Asia’s chronically food deficit nations like China, Bangladesh, India, and Japan. Grown uni­versally in Southeast Asia, the principal producers are Indonesia, Thailand, Viet­nam, Myanmar and the Philippines.

Cambodia, Laos and Malaysia are also sig­nificant producers. Production has increased substantially during the last twenty years particularly in Indonesia and Thailand. In­donesia has been an important importer of rice from Thailand, but dependence on im­ports has steadily decreased as it stepped up its production during the 1980s.