Until 2010, the Akha traditionally subsisted by raising livestock and growing rice, vegetables and beans.
The purpose, Mr Sankoh's lieutenants explained, was to stop people from growing rice that might go to feed government troops.
He is growing rice, corn and other staples on thousands of acres, for the home market as well as for export to Saudi Arabia.
One success involved growing rice using specially bred ducks.
Worse, the cyclone, which hit Myanmar's main rice-growing areas, may intensify the worldwide panic over rice supplies, which has already led to food riots in many countries (see article).
Rice growing, in particular, is a heavy consumer of water: it takes some 5, 000 liters of water to produce 1 kg of rice.
And in places like California (the second largest rice growing state in the U.S.), weeds are now resistant to almost every (legal) chemical known to humankind.
Ostreicher and his family have claimed from the beginning that he is innocent, and presented a judge what they say is evidence that all of the money invested in a rice growing operation came from legal sources.
Ostreicher was arrested in June 2011 on suspicion of money laundering tied to a rice-growing operation.
Growing up, Ms Rice dreamed of becoming a senator for the District of Columbia.
"Begin the expropriation process with Cargill, " he said in a nationally televised speech in which he accused the company of growing specialized forms of rice in an attempt to evade price controls.
Rice exports also growing strong--they were up 27% on year during February.
"We're building market share by opening in areas where we are growing the market, " says Troy Rice , Depot's senior vice president for store operations.
Researchers at Rice University have developed a method of successfully growing synthetic collagen, and their results were published in a recent issue of Nature Chemistry.
Houston is the fastest-growing and most ethnically diverse metropolitan area in the country, says Stephen Klineberg, co-director of Rice University's Kinder Institute for Urban Research.
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' If you are talking about climate change, for instance, rice paddies emit very significant levels of methane, but you can't very well criticize people for growing food.
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