What is wheat?
Q: What is wheat?
A: Wheat (Genus: Triticum) is a cereal grain, a kind of grass whose fruit is a "head of wheat" with edible seeds.
Q: Where was it first grown?
A: Wheat was first grown in the Levant, a region of the Near East.
Q: How much wheat is produced globally?
A: Almost 800,000,000 tonnes are harvested every year globally.
Q: What role did wheat play in the emergence of city-based societies?
A: Wheat was a key factor enabling the emergence of city-based societies at the start of civilization as it could be easily cultivated on a large scale and its seeds could be stored for long periods in dry climates. It helped the growth of city-states in the Fertile Crescent, including Babylonian, Assyrian and Persian empires.
Q: What are some common uses for wheat?
A: Common uses for wheat include making flour to make leavened, flat and steamed breads, biscuits, cookies, cakes, breakfast cereal pasta noodles couscous; fermenting to make ethanol or biofuel; and other food products.
Q: Is there any health risk associated with eating wheat?
A: Yes - an allergy to wheat (mostly from its gluten) can cause coeliac disease which makes sufferers have diarrhoea if they eat any food containing wheat.
