On news of bans in China, Vietnam, Cambodia, India and Egypt (which between them grew 40% of world rice exports in 2007), the price tripled within a few weeks.

ECONOMIST: The real lesson from volatile commodity prices

You'll read about the Santa Cruz fishermen who caught Dave's Fancy Chinook King Salmon by hook and line, the family farm that grew the ingredients in the Lundberg honey nut rice cakes and the creation myth behind Honest Tea's tea bags.

FORBES: A Story Goes With It

Danny Bowien, the thirty-year-old Korean-born chef and main owner of Mission Chinese Food, grew up in Oklahoma eating the Chinese dishes of Middle America, fried rice and lo mein.

NEWYORKER: Mission Chinese Food

After the second world war, dwarf varieties of wheat and rice (which overcame the problem that heavily fertilised crops in hot countries grew too tall and fell over) boosted developing-country output.

ECONOMIST: Make it cheaper, and cheaper | The