The Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization said Myanmar’s Ministry of Agriculture estimated that 3.95 million acres (1.6 million hectares) of rice fields were damaged by the May 3 cyclone which killed tens of thousands of people and forced hundreds of thousands of farmers off their flood-ravaged land, especially in the Irrawaddy delta.

“If we are not able to plant before the monsoon, we will have a serious shortage of rice in the country,” Leon Gouws, the acting FAO representative in Myanmar, told The Associated Press. “(The region) is the main rice producer in Myanmar. It will prolong the emergency and keep the people dependent on food aid.”

Gouws said many of the fields have been inundated with salt water, as many as 200,000 water buffalo and cattle were killed, and many farm communities have been totally destroyed.

The Ministry of Agriculture estimates US$243 million (€157 million) is needed to rehabilitate the rice fields, which produce 65 percent of the country’s rice crop, including funds to buy 50,000 tons of rice seed, Gouws said. About 6,000 tons of seed would be of a salt-resistant variety.

“We will try to plant as much as possible,” he said.

Gouws said the damage to the rice sector could have repercussions across the region and beyond.

Prices of rice have surged 50 percent in Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, since the cyclone and Gouws estimated it would continue to impact rice prices — especially if Myanmar is forced to start importing the staple.

Myanmar has previously produced enough for its own needs and this year was projected to export 600,000 tons before the cyclone hit.

“A lot of that has been diverted now to in-country needs,” Gouws said, adding that the country has curtailed rice exports to Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

“This will feed into the worldwide price rises of commodities, especially rice,” he said.

Earlier in the week, FAO said the devastation in Myanmar may reduce global rice production. The agency currently is forecasting a record 666 million tons worldwide this year, an increase of 2.3 percent.

Production in Asia is expected to rise to 605 million tons from 600 million tons, with particularly large increases in Bangladesh, China, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, FAO said.

Production in Africa is forecast to grow nearly 4 percent to 23.2 million tons and in Latin America by 7.4 percent to 26 million tons, the agency said.

Rice production is expected to decline in Australia, the United States and Europe.

Global rice prices skyrocketed by 76 percent from December to April, triggered in part by export restrictions in countries worried about food scarcity. FAO said prices are expected to remain high.