Background Research

In Australia, years of drought have seen rice growers' water allocations slashed, and only a handful of producers have been able to harvest crops.
Some supermarket shoppers in America are facing rice rations - as a global shortage of the grain prompts retailers to restrict supplies.

http://news.sbs.com.au/worldnewsaustralia/global_rice_shortage_sparks_panic_545601

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Crop shortfalls from natural disasters

Several distinct weather- and climate-related incidents have caused disruptions in crop production. Perhaps the most influential is the extended drought in Australia, in particular the fertile Murray-Darling Basin, which produces large amounts of wheat and rice. The drought has caused the annual rice harvest to fall by as much as 98% from pre-drought levels. Australia is historically the second-largest exporter of wheat after the United States, producing up to 25 million tons in a good year, the vast majority for export. However, the 2006 harvest was 9.8 million. Other events that have negatively affected the price of food include the 2006 heat wave in California's San Joaquin Valley, which killed large numbers of farm animals, and unseasonable 2008 rains in Kerala, India, which destroyed swathes of grain. Scientists have stated that several of these incidents are consistent with the predicted effects of climate change.

Soil and productivity losses

Sundquist points out that large areas of croplands are lost year after year, due mainly to soil erosion, water depletion and urbanisation. According to him "60,000 km2/ year of land becomes so severely degraded that it loses its productive capacity and becomes wasteland", and even more are affected to a lesser extend, adding to the crop supply problem. Additionally, agricultural production is also lost due to water depletion.

^{http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_price_crisis#Crop_shortfalls_from_natural_disasters}