South Korea's rice output dropped slightly in 2016 from last year due mainly to the bad weather conditions in the harvest season, government data showed Tuesday.

The country's rice production reached 4.2 million tons this year, down 3 percent from 4.33 million tons in 2015, according to the data compiled by Statistics Korea.


But the 2016 figure marks a 6.1 percent gain from the five-year average of 3.96 million tons amid years of bumper harvests.

The statistics agency said the weather condition in September was cloudy and rainy when the rice grains began to ripen.

A total of 779,000 hectares of rice paddies was cultivated this year, down 2.6 percent from last year.

Earlier, the South Korean government said it will purchase all of this year's rice surplus, forecast to be some 300,000 tons, as part of efforts to deal with a chronic supply glut of the staple crop. (Yonhap)