LUPAO, Philippines -- Fortunato Villanueva Jr. is preparing to harvest unhusked rice this month from land he has worked for more than 30 years.
The area where Villanueva works, Lupao, is filled with gleaming rice fields and dotted with palm trees, part of a warm, wet landscape ideal for cultivating the staple of Asian diets. Roughly 200 kilometers from the traffic jams, smog and chaotic energy of Metro Manila, it accounts for much of the rice produced in this country of more than 109 million people.
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