Arkansas was the top producer of rice in the United States, generating about 107 million centum weight of rice in 2023. California came in second with 43.97 million centum weight of rice in that year.
Rice trade with the U.S.
The United States exports a large volume of rice every year. In 2022/2023, 2.25 million metric tons of rice was exported overseas from the United States. Mexico was the leading destination for U.S. rice exports, with just about 616 thousand metric tons of rice imports in 2020. Haiti and Japan were also major destinations for U.S.-grown rice.
Global rice consumption
The top three consumers of rice in the world are China, India, and Bangladesh. As an inexpensive and versatile grain, rice has become more popular over the last decade worldwide. In the 2008/2009 trade year, 437.18 million metric tons of rice were consumed worldwide, and by 2021/2022 that figure had increased to about 519.9 million metric tons of rice. In the United States, rice consumption has fluctuated over the last several years but has since leveled out at around 4.6 million metric tons.
