The quantity of goods sold at the monthly government-organized produce fairs demonstrates how Cuba s food situation has eased 15 years after widespread shortages were sparked by the Soviet Union s collapse and an end to economic subsidies from the Kremlin. HAVANA Hundreds of trucks overflowing with plantains, sweet potatoes and onions converge on the Plaza of the Revolution each month as farmers sell produce to tens of thousands of people. The quantity of goods sold at the monthly...

Consequently, rice importation reduced from two million tonnes, in 2003, to less than one million tonnes in 2005, with a corresponding decline in the amount of foreign exchange spent on rice imports. UNTILL recently, local rice was largely shunned in preference for imported cereal because of its poor quality, until the Federal Government slammed a ban on rice imports and imposed a 10 per cent levy on such imports. PrOpCom is a market-driven intervention programme that facilitates...

ONE of the nation's key water experts has called for a permanent system under which cotton and rice farmers would phase down production during drought years. He said farmers producing crops such as cotton and rice would find it more difficult to operate continually every year, especially as climate change brought more extremes in weather patterns. Cotton Australia chief executive Adam Kay said farmers were already responding to the seasons, with planting rising and falling with water...

It is not known as to when three food security missions for rice, wheat and pulses to be implemented by the states, would be launched. Addressing Members of Parliament on May 17 at the Library Building within Parliament House complex, the internationally renowned agricultural scientist Dr MS Swaminathan who is now a nominated Member of the Rajya Sabha, displayed a diagram which this writer had seen about 28 years ago in a booklet entitled "From Begging Bowl to Bread Basket" authored by the...

Japanese rice producers are looking forward to cracking the Chinese market where about 200 million tons of rice is consumed annually. The Japanese government hopes exports will expand domestic rice production, which has been hard hit by the falling birthrate and the aging society. Get Malaysia Sun headlines emailed to you daily. China wants expensive Japanese rice Malaysia Sun Sunday 1st July, 2007. The Japanese have resumed rice exports to China with a shipment of 24 tons from Yokohama....