Should we eat less rice?
The Food Chain
BBC
4.7 • 545 Ratings
🗓️ 16 January 2025
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Rice is the main staple for over half the world’s population.
The crop has problems though – it is vulnerable to climate change, whether that’s drought or flooding. It’s also a crop that contributes to climate change, as it uses more water than other grain crops and is frequently grown in flooded conditions. Rice production is also a big source of methane emissions.
In this programme Ruth Alexander hears about the possible solutions to these problems. Dr Yvonne Pinto, Director General of the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines talks about their work developing new varieties of rice, and new more sustainable farming techniques.
One rice company trialling these techniques is Tilda in the UK. General Manager Jean-Philippe Laborde explains what difference it’s made to water and fertiliser use as well as methane emissions.
Given the problems with rice, should we just eat less of it?
Jakob Klein, anthropologist at SOAS University of London explains the Chinese government’s attempts to convince people to eat more potato as a staple food.
And we talk about the cultural importance of rice with listeners in the Philippines and Bangladesh.
If you’d like to contact the programme email thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk
Presented by Ruth Alexander.
Produced by Beatrice Pickup.
(Image: a steaming bowl of rice with chopsticks above it holding a mouthful of white rice grains. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, I've just nipped in before your BBC podcast starts to tell you all about |
| 0:03.3 | You're Dead to Me. We're the comedy podcast that takes history seriously, also from the BBC |
| 0:07.8 | and presented by me, Greg Jenner. I should have told you that at the beginning, sorry. |
| 0:11.9 | Anyway, like many other BBC podcasts, such as Desert Island Discs, Evil Genius, or In Our Time, |
| 0:17.2 | your Dead to Me is available first on BBC Sounds, a whole month earlier than anywhere |
| 0:22.2 | else in fact. So if you can't wait another day to hear the very latest in history and loads |
| 0:27.4 | of other good stuff, then listen first on BBC Sounds. We need to talk about rice. When we think |
| 0:34.9 | of meals in Bangladesh, the first dish that comes to mind is the rice. |
| 0:40.3 | So rice is never on the side. It's the center. |
| 0:45.4 | Rice is the absolute heartbeat of every Filipino dish. |
| 0:50.0 | It's more than a staple. It's cultural cornerstone. |
| 0:55.1 | It's one of the most widely eaten foods in the world and getting more popular. |
| 0:59.8 | There is a massive aspirational element to eating rice. |
| 1:03.0 | And that's an issue. |
| 1:04.3 | Rice is a very thirsty plant. |
| 1:07.4 | It's both under pressure from climate change and part of the problem. |
| 1:12.0 | In this episode of the food chain from the BBC World Service with me Ruth Alexander, |
| 1:17.1 | we're finding out what's being done about the unsustainable production practices |
| 1:21.1 | and asking whether we should or even could eat less rice. |
| 1:26.6 | Our first guest has long been fascinated by rice. |
| 1:30.7 | It's somewhat amusing to admit that I came to work here when I was an intern 39 years ago. |
| 1:39.2 | And it's really that that inspired my attention to how important a crop this was in the context of the globe |
... |
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