Rice is the most widely consumed staple food in the world. It supplies a major share of daily calories for billions of people, especially across Asia, where it has shaped agriculture, cuisine, trade, and settlement for thousands of years.
Rice belongs to the grass species Oryza sativa, commonly called Asian rice, and Oryza glaberrima, African rice. It grows especially well in warm regions with abundant water, from flooded paddies to carefully managed irrigated fields. Although white rice is familiar worldwide, brown rice, black rice, red rice, and aromatic varieties such as basmati and jasmine are also important foods.
Rice is often confused with wheat because wheat is one of the world’s most important crops and is central to bread, pasta, and noodles. Maize is also a major staple, particularly in parts of the Americas and Africa. The wording matters: rice is commonly described as the world’s most widely consumed staple, while rankings can differ depending on whether researchers measure calories, production weight, cultivated area, or regional dependence.
Rice cultivation has also transformed landscapes. Irrigated paddies can support very high yields, but flooded fields produce methane, a greenhouse gas, so researchers continue developing water-saving cultivation methods.