China, Japan, Southeast Asia, and India have all grown and
consumed vast quantities of rice for thousands of years.
Millet, a grain that produces small seeds, is currently
grown worldwide both as food for humans and as fodder for
animals. Millet contains about 11 percent protein, about the
sa me a mount as wheat. It does not rise li ke wheat, so it ca nnot
be used to ma ke leavened bread. People genera lly grind it into
fl our to make fl at bread or boil it into porridge. Millet was
fi rst domesticated in China around the same time as rice.
A leafy plant that grows from a tuber, taro is much like a
potato. People grow taro mainly for its root, though they eat
the leaves as well. Taro plants, also called elephant ears, look
like caladiums, which are common garden plants. Taro was
one of the fi rst plants to be cultivated, and it is still grown
throughout Southeast Asia and the Pacifi c islands. Its ances-
tors grow wild in much of tropical Asia, and tubers are easy
to propagate by cutting them into pieces and burying them.
Taro needs a steady supply of water, but most of the region
has ample rainfall. Taro root is very starchy; people eat it
mainly for calories. It also contains some fi ber, vitamin B 6 ,
and manganese. Taro must be cooked before eating, because
the raw plant can damage the stomach and intestines. Gen-
erally, ancient people boiled it into a kind of porridge. Taro
leaves are full of vitamins and supplied many necessary nu-
trients to peoples’ diets.
Asian nations grow a huge variety of fruits and vegetables,
many of which were domesticated thousands of years ago. In
tropical areas people long ago cultivated bananas, oranges,
coconuts, breadfruits, durians, mangoes, papayas, lemons,
grapefruits, sago palms, cucumbers, and jackfruits, as well as
many others. In China people grew mustard greens, daikons,
numerous beans, snow peas, eggplants, cabbage plants such
as bok choy, and melons. Th ese vegetables and fruits added
color and nutrients to an otherwise bland and nutrient-poor
diet composed mainly of starches.
Th e soybean has been grown in Asia for many centuries.
People fi rst grew soybeans not for food but as a nitrogen-fi x-
ing crop; they grew the plants and then plowed them back
into the fi elds to prepare the soil for other crops. Around the
fi rst century c.e. people discovered methods of fermentation
and used those to form soy into a variety of food products,
such as miso, soy sauce, and tofu. Aft er that discovery, soy
became an important source of protein for many people in
China, Korea, and Japan. Asian people from ancient times to
the present have obtained most of their calories and nutrients
from vegetable foods. Animal protein in the ancient world
came in large part from domestic pigs and chickens, which
provided both eggs and meat. People also caught fi sh and
hunted for wild birds and other game. In some areas people
ate rodents and insects.
THE ORIGINS OF AGRICULTURE IN CHINA
Agriculture in China developed independently in two very
diff erent locations. Farmers domesticated rice along the
Yangtze River in southern China between 6500 and 4500
b.c.e. During approximately the same time period, farmers
in northern China concentrated on the cultivation of millet
on the banks of the Yellow River.
Th e Yangtze River runs through the southern part of
China and enters the Pacifi c Ocean near the site of the mod-
ern city Shanghai. Th e Yangtze basin is warm and wet and
has a stable temperate to subtropical climate. Rain falls year-
round, though about half of the annual rainfall occurs in the
three months of summer. Th e lowlands around the river be-
come inundated with shallow water every summer, and this
water drains away by autumn. Major fl oods, droughts, cold
snaps, and other extremes of weather are uncommon. Such a
temperate climate made the Yangtze basin an ideal location
for early experiments in agriculture.
Th e fi rst farmers had to work with plants that already
grew in the area. Wild rice existed throughout southern Chi-
na and Southeast Asia before it was cultivated. Archaeologists
and botanists have tried to identify the wild ancestor of mod-
ern rice, but they have had only limited success; rice has been
so widely cultivated and moved so far across Asia that it is
impossible to tell which ancient grain was its ancestor. Th ere
are still annual (living only one year) and perennial (living
several years) varieties of rice growing in South Asia, and sci-
entists have based their theories about the domestication of
rice on these plants.
Modern wild rice varieties live in places that fl ood yearly.
Th ey start growing when the land is covered with shallow wa-
ter, up to about 18 inches deep. When the rainy season ends,
they release their seeds, which scatter on the drying ground
and lie dormant until the fl oods arrive the next year. Th e ear-
liest cultivated types of rice, then, were plants that grew in the
border zone between land that was permanently dry and land
that was always covered with water.
Ancient people lived as hunter-gatherers, hunting for
wild game and fi sh and gathering wild plant foods. Wild rice
was one of the foods they collected and ate. Th ey would have
noticed the life cycle of the rice plant, following the progress
of its growth through the yearly fl oods. Farming probably
resulted from attempts to increase the area on which wild
rice grew. Historians believe that people built circular dams
to trap fl oodwaters, fl ooding land that had prev iously stayed
dr y and a l low ing rice to grow t here. Th ey would break down
the dams at the end of the wet season to let the ground dry
and permit the rice seeds to germinate. Th ey might have
further increased the rice crop by scattering wild seeds they
had collected elsewhere inside the artifi cially fl ooded area.
Th e next step was the deliberate harvesting and sowing of
the seeds that grew in these enclosures, sometimes called
rice paddies.
Th e oldest-known site of rice cultivation was Peng-
toushan on the Liying Plain; scientists believe its inhabit-
ants were growing rice around 6400 b.c.e. Hangzhou Bay,
just south of the mouth of the Yangtze, was the site of a
large society that grew up around rice cultivation about
4500 b.c.e. People grew rice and other aquatic crops in the30 agriculture: Asia and the Pacific