section_path: Development and diffusion/In East Asia
section_name: In East Asia
paragraph_text: In East Asia
  
  Agriculture in Neolithic China can be separated into two broad regions, Northern China and Southern China.
  
  The agricultural centre in northern China is believed to be the homelands of the early Sino-Tibetan -speakers, associated with the Houli, Peiligang, Cishan, and Xinglongwa cultures, clustered around the Yellow River basin. It was the domestication centre for foxtail millet (Setaria italica) and broomcorn millet (Panicum miliaceum), with early evidence of domestication approximately 8,000 years ago, and widespread cultivation 7,500 years ago. (Soybean was also domesticated in northern China 4,500 years ago. Orange and peach also originated in China, being cultivated c. 2500 BCE.)
  
  The agricultural centres in southern China are clustered around the Yangtze River basin. Rice was domesticated in this region, together with the development of paddy field cultivation, between 13,500 and 8,200 years ago.
  
  There are two possible centres of domestication for rice. The first is in the lower Yangtze River, believed to be the homelands of pre-Austronesians and associated with the Kauhuqiao, Hemudu, Majiabang, and Songze cultures. It is characterized by typical pre-Austronesian features, including stilt houses, jade carving, and boat technologies. Their diet were also supplemented by acorns, water chestnuts, foxnuts, and pig domestication. The second is in the middle Yangtze River, believed to be the homelands of the early Hmong-Mien -speakers and associated with the Pengtoushan and Daxi cultures. Both of these regions were heavily populated and had regular trade contacts with each other, as well as with early Austroasiatic speakers to the west, and early Kra-Dai speakers to the south, facilitating the spread of rice cultivation throughout southern China.
  
  The millet and rice-farming cultures also first came into contact with each other at around 9,000 to 7,000 BP, resulting in a corridor between the millet and rice cultivation centres where both rice and millet were cultivated. At around 5,500 to 4,000 BP, there was increasing migration into Taiwan from the early Austronesian Dapenkeng culture, bringing rice and millet cultivation technology with them. During this period, there is evidence of large settlements and intensive rice cultivation in Taiwan and the Penghu Islands, which may have resulted in overexploitation. Bellwood (2011) proposes that this may have been the impetus of the Austronesian expansion which started with the migration of the Austronesian-speakers from Taiwan to the Philippines at around 5,000 BP.
  
  Austronesians carried rice cultivation technology to Island Southeast Asia along with other domesticated species. The new tropical island environments also had new food plants that they exploited. They carried useful plants and animals during each colonization voyage, resulting in the rapid introduction of domesticated and semi-domesticated species throughout Oceania. They also came into contact with the early agricultural centres of Papuan -speaking populations of New Guinea as well as the Dravidian -speaking regions of South India and Sri Lanka by around 3,500 BP. They acquired further cultivated food plants like bananas and pepper from them, and in turn introduced Austronesian technologies like wetland cultivation and outrigger canoes. During the 1st millennium CE, they also colonized Madagascar and the Comoros, bringing Southeast Asian food plants, including rice, to East Africa.