The Price of Rice

Oh snap! Two posts in one day~ we are on a roll!

One clear sign to us at Radio Hybrid of the impending/existing apocalypse is the phenomenal increase in food prices. This has led to riots around the world, as well as rationing in various countries, and even here in the US, o land of plenty, Costco and Sam's Club have been limiting the number of bags of rice you can purchase. Ironically, while 88% of rice consumed in the US is grown here, the US also is one of the biggest rice exporters in the world - representing 13% of global rice exports (both according to the USA Rice Federation). Talk about capitalism at work!!! India and Vietnam each export a bit more rice than the US, and Thailand, biggest rice exporter of all, sells about three times as much as the United States.

Rice is a really important food staple for many people, and we have discussed its significance and what's going on with it and other food on our show over the past few months. While some people have said that rice production needs to be increased by developing new strains with higher yield, our friend dj starbane disagrees, and some facts support him. Starbane says it's a lot more complicated than manipulating rice plants to produce more, and that we should all put more emphasis on growing our own food. On the other hand, starbane notes that as some have observed, growth of the middle class in China and India is also a factor in the increase. "The answer is to destroy the middle class altogether and keep 99% of people poor," says starbane, "therefor nothing really needs to change."

At Radio Hybrid we do support class war, against the rich and middle class that is, but we also like eating food we grow ourselves. On wednesday we had a nice salad of the tiniest lettuce that we had thinned from front yard plot and roof-top boxes, delicious with some added cherry tomatoes, pickle and vinaigrette dressing. We've also been eating kale and collards from a roof box, and plenty of garlic scapes. We are excited about the growth of plants that bent and starbane planted in the front yard of a neighbor a couple doors down - including collards, tomatoes, peppers and eggplant!

Of course rice is not the only food rising in price - so is corn, wheat (even as its price falls on commodity markets, gotta love capitalism), dairy products and meat. And that is rough stuff for those of us who love to eat a piece of meat - like mothershiester, bent and Adesh Samaroo, who has a great song, "Eating Meat" (until we figure out this blogging thing and can stream here, you'll have to follow the links, sorry!)