Global rice demand may outstrip supply

Nov 9, 2010, 7:24 GMT

Hanoi - The world is likely to be short of rice in the next decade without new measures to increase production, experts at a global rice conference said Tuesday.

Rice production needs to rise 1.5 per cent per year to keep up with demand, even as the available land for rice farming shrinks due to urbanisation and climate change, industry officials said.

'Projected demand for rice will outstrip supply in the near to medium term unless something is done to reverse current trends of slow productivity growth,' said Robert Zeigler, director general of the International Rice Research Institute.

Zeigler said several governments had reduced their forecasts for harvests in the upcoming year. Crops in Pakistan were hit by floods, while China has experienced both flood and drought.

'It does not look to be at a crisis level, but it's possible that supplies will tighten a little bit,' Zeigler said.

Other speakers noted the increase concerns over rice security since 2008, when forecasts of shortages triggered price surges that plunged 100 million people into poverty, the World Bank estimated.

Rice productivity surged from the 1960s through the 1990s, but productivity increases have since fallen to about 1 per cent per year, according to the institute. That is not enough to keep pace with demand.

Thailand and Vietnam are the world's two largest rice exporters, but both are losing paddy area to urbanisation and increased salinity in delta regions linked to rising sea levels.

Zeigler said more investment in infrastructure and research is needed, as well as new hybrid and genetically modified strains.

'I'm convinced that if governments adopt enlightened policies, we will have enough rice,' Zeigler said. 'If we don't do anything, the world will suffer, of course.'

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