African rice (Oryza glaberrima)

Oryza glaberrima is thought to have been domesticated from the wild Oryza barthii by peoples of the floodplains at the bend of the Niger, in present-day Mali, 2,000–3,000 years ago; Asian rice was domesticated independently. From there it spread to secondary centres on the Gambia–Casamance–Guinea-Bissau coast and in the Guinea forest between Sierra Leone and western Côte d'Ivoire. Portuguese visitors in the 15th and 16th centuries admired West African wet-rice farming with dikes and transplanting.

African rice generally has small pear-shaped grains with red bran and an olive-to-black seed coat. Compared with Asian rice its seed scatters easily, its grain is brittle and hard to mill and its yields are lower, so it has been widely replaced. Some farmers, including the Jola of southern Senegal, still grow it for ritual use. Grain dimensions on this page are estimated from the "small grain" description.