Archaeological discoveries in Daoxian County, Hunan Province and Wannian County, Jiangxi Province show that humans began to grow and eat food about 13000 years ago. Before the Neolithic Age, humans should have chewed the whole rice with their mouths.

The Hemudu site excavated in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River has evidence of rice cultivation. In the history of rice, the earliest people who planted rice were the Chinese ancestors in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. As early as 7000 years ago, the primitive residents in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River in China had completely mastered the rice planting technology and took rice as their staple food.

Hemudu culture in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River entered the Neolithic Age about 7000 years later, and Chu Jiu's invention was applied. People know how to clean and separate inedible chaff and rice bran. Soon, it should be found that water elutriation is a more effective impurity removal and cleaning process. The process of washing rice is still in use, and the rice manufacturing equipment in Chu Jiu was still in use until the 1970s.