DUSHANBE, May 14, 2009, Asia-Plus — In a report released at a briefing in Dushanbe, Saidmurod Bahriddinov, the head of the crop sector directorate within the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), noted on May 13 that the MoA specialists have recommended farmers to use early ripening cotton varieties to replant the rain-hit and flooded fields.
“Farmers are recommended to use Tajik early ripening cotton varieties such as Iram-1 MN, Sorbon, Mehrgon, Zarnigor and Ziroatkor-64 that ripen in 100 days,” Bahriddinov said.
Torrential rain has damaged 5,390 hectares of cotton fields in the country. Damage caused to the cotton sub-sector by heavy rainfalls has been estimated at 5.39 million somoni.
On the grain crops, the MoA official said that specialists expected grain harvests to be much higher this year compared to 2008. “Last year, we did not harvest any center of wheat from dry-farming lands due to lack of rains and drought,” said Bahriddinov. “While this year, cereals on these fields are repining very well.”
He noted that this year, cereals have been planted on an area of more than 216,000 hectares, including more than 120,000 hectares of irrigated lands. The MoA official is confident that Tajikistan will harvest more than 1 million tons of cereals this year.
