Cereal

Cereal crops are mostly grasses cultivated for their edible seeds (actually a fruit called a caryopsis). Cereal grains are grown in greater quantities worldwide than any other type of crop and provides more food energy to the human race than any other crop. more...

In some developing nations, cereal grains constitute practically the entire diet of common folk. In developed nations, cereal consumption is more moderate but still substantial. The word cereal has its origin in the Roman goddess of grain, Ceres. Staple food grains are traditionally called corn in Britain, though that word became specified for maize in the United States, Canada and Australia.

Cereal crops

True cereals

The cereal crops are (in approximate order of greatest annual production):

• wheat, the primary cereal of temperate regions
• rice, the primary cereal of tropical regions
• maize, a staple food of peoples in North America, South America, and Africa and of livestock worldwide; called "corn" or "Indian corn" in North America and Australia
• millets, a group of similar but distinct cereals that form an important staple food in Asia and Africa.
• sorghums, important staple food in Asia and Africa and popular worldwide for livestock
• rye and triticale, important in cold climates
• oats, formerly the staple food of Scotland and popular worldwide for livestock
• barley, grown for malting and livestock on land too poor or too cold for wheat
• fonio, several varieties of which are grown as food crops in Africa
• teff, popular in Ethiopia but scarcely known elsewhere
• wild rice, grown in small amounts in North America
• spelt, a close relative of wheat

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