eli5: Why do Asian countries have such high populations?

Question

What the title says. India and china alone have almost 3 billion. Asia has over half the worlds population. Why has this historically been the case even though many Asian countries developed far slower than European countries.

In: Other

Answer 1

Rice.

Fast growing. Plentiful. High energy yield. Labour intensive but energy yield vastly outweighs the amount of energy needed to produce it.

Massive famines occur when a rice harvest fails.