Significant increase in areas planted with wheat and barley in Syria

Damascus, SANA- The areas cultivated with wheat and barley in Syria for the current season have witnessed a notable increase in comparison with the last season as a result of the increase in the amount of rainfalls and the return of peasants to their hometowns following the prevalence of security and stability in most of the important agricultural areas.

Director of Agricultural Production Department at the Agriculture Ministry Abdul-Moeen Qadmani told SANA that the execution rate of the plan of wheat cultivation for the current season reached 70 percent out of the plan which was estimated at 1,801,094 hectares while the execution rate of barley cultivation reached 96 percent out of 1,499,866 hectares which had been planned to be cultivated with barley and the process is ongoing, particularly with regard to the irrigated wheat.

Qadmani added that the areas cultivated with wheat hit 1,253,420 hectares till Jan. 15 in comparison with 1,066,612 hectares in the same period last year with an increase of about 180 thousand hectares.

He added that the areas cultivated with irrigated wheat reached up to 530 thousand hectares with an execution rate estimated at 59 percent while the areas cultivated with rainfed wheat reached more than 723 thousand hectares out of the planned areas which are estimated at about 907 thousand hectares with an execution rate of 80 percent.

Regarding to the plans of cultivating barley, Qadmani indicated that the plan is in its final stages as 1,437,416 hectares have been planted with barley out of the plan which was estimated at 1, 499,866 hectares with an execution rate estimated at 96 percent.

He added that the execution rate of rainfed barley reached 96 percent while the execution rate of the irrigated barley reached up to 93 percent.

Ruaa al-Jazaeri