The farmers were happy as they could sell their rice and be paid in whole for a larger quantity. It was a political no-brainer. Sounds great right? Wrong. The government spent $4b (yes, $4 billion dollars) on purchasing and stockpiling all this rice. What they planned to do was stem exports so that it would drive up global demand due to the shortage. Therefore, causing a spike and effectively drive up the purchase price by 50%. The government could then make a nice profit from that rice.