Promise to compensate poor crops in Sudan’s El Gezira

The Sudanese Ministry of Agriculture will compensate farmers in El Gezira state for their poor crops after they were provided with rotten wheat seeds imported from Turkey. The Ministry in El Gezira admitted that bad storage was one of the reasons which had led to the problem and that Turkey was not to blame. A committee reported that 16,500 acres using the seeds showed reduced germination from ten per cent to sixty per cent.Its report concluded that there was a shortage in the quantity of seeds, saying that the available seeds only sufficed for 160,000 acres while 300,000 acres were due to be cultivated. The committee recommended the Ministry to compensate farmers after the end of the agricultural season, localise wheat seeds cultivation and offer standard-compatible storehouses. The Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Natural resources in El Gezira, Abdallah Mohamed Osman, had earlier announced the cultivation of 101,000 acres of wheat in the Gezira agricultural scheme, compared to the 70,000 acres last year. He had also announced the cultivation of more than 26,000 acres of sunflower in the El Rahad scheme. Sudan currently imports more than 2 million tonnes of wheat annually at a cost of $900 million. (Source: Sudan Tribune)File photo Radio DabangaRelated: Turkish wheat seeds fail to grow in Sudan’s El Gezira (19 November 2013)