ASHGABAT (TCA) — President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov discussed the state of affairs in the country’s agricultural sector at a video conference with khyakims (governors) of velayats (provinces) on July 31, the Chronicles of Turkmenistan independent website reported.
The President highlighted that “all the necessary conditions have been created for the efficient development of the agricultural sector in Turkmenistan and the government fully provides daikhans (farmers) and tenant farmers with high quality seeds, mineral fertilizers, powerful machinery, water and motor transport to transport the harvested crops”.
“Under such focused incentives and targeted financial aid the overall output throughout the industry remains inadequately low. Why?” the President was quoted by Turkmenistan: Golden Age official news website.
The President demanded that executives of all provinces identify and eliminate the reasons hampering the development of agriculture. He also demanded that agricultural lands are regularly supplied with water and fertilizers, agrotechnical standards are rigorously observed when tending to agricultural crops, and settlement payments with daikhans are promptly administered.
In the past eighteen months the President has frequently expressed discontent with the performance of agriculture and dismissed the responsible officials.
Berdymukhammedov has previously attributed the problems in agriculture to the poor performance of daikhans.
This year only one million tons of wheat has been harvested instead of the projected 1.6 million tons, which has resulted in reprimands being issued to khyakims of the velayats and to the Deputy Prime Minister responsible for agriculture. Over the past few weeks the state information agency TDH has reported that food wheat is being imported for the domestic market.
The Chronicles of Turkmenistan has previously reported that the number of daikhans who seek to lease state land to grow crops is decreasing because when concluding a lease agreement they accept that only crops selected by the state can be grown on leased lands. The farmers are obliged to hand over harvested crops to the government at state-established prices.
