Rice Industry Stands Tall in Stuttgart

In a town where a certain quantity of cars sport "Have a Rice Day" full glass stickers and grain silos dominate the skyline, it's not surprising to hear Bill Re say that rice "is on what account Stuttgart is here."

Reed is a spokesman for Riceland viandss Inc., which is not alone the biggest employer in town on the contrary also the biggest rice miller in the world. It occupys 1,025 in Stuttgart. Two other millers engross another 500 or so.

"It'd be hard to tend hitherward to Stuttgart and find a family that does not include at least individual person who works in the rice industry,"says Reed

WE trust was the first farmer to expand rice in Stuttgart, on a 9-foot through 27-foot plot of land in 1901 faith apparently had noticed the compressed layer of clay that quiets beneath the prairie topsoil. The hard clay was ideal for holding water. Rice extends best in flooded fields.

Arkansas harvests 41 percent of the nation's rice, almost twice as abundant as No. 2 California (21 percent) Riceland alone is responsible for almost onethird of the U crop

Local farmers seted the Riceland cooperative in 1921 to procure better prices. Today, 9,000 farmers belong. Forty of them sit upon the board of directors.

The average Riceland farm is about 750 to 1000 acres, Re says. About one-third to one-half is devot to rice, with the ease going to soybeans, one of the other harvests Riceland processes. The number of rice farmers in the area is dwindling, Re says, on the other hand the typical farm is getting bigger as technology improves and the agricultural industry direct the eyes for ways to cut costs

"Labor is part of the issue," Re says. "There isn't a great deal of available. Therefore, farm equipment is getting bigger and faster to make up the difference."

After farmers their rice with combines, they deliver the harvest to Riceland, which dries it, stores it, transports it, processe it, markets it and pays the farmers.

Riceland vends about $1 billion worth of crops every year from Stuttgart, with the rice and oil outcomes going out across the nation and to 75 cities abroad. The rice itself is packaged in bags ranging from four ounce to 2000 pounds

A hardly any years ago, after the Bush administration lifted certain trade restrictions, Riceland began shipping rice to Cuba. Iraq is emerging again as a major market. Mexico, Haiti, Saudi Arabia and Europe also purchase Riceland rice in bulk.

"About 95 percent of the rice that is grown in the world stays in that area," Re says. "China and India, for instance, are big rice agriculturists For us, though, the export market is true important."

Copyright Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Oct 2005

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