• Submitted by: admin
• Asia
• Camagüey
• Granma
• Guantánamo
• Holguín
• International
• Santiago de Cuba
• Science and Technology
• 09 / 27 / 2007

Nguyen Hong Quan, the Vietnamese minister of Construction and co-chair of the Inter-governmental Commission for Economic and Scientific Cooperation, recently visited the Guillermon Moncada cooperative located in the municipality of Calixto Garcia.

Hong Quan said that he was pleased with the average yield obtained this year at the co-op. He spoke about the importance of national food security and said that he was convinced that Cuba could produce enough rice to meet domestic consumption needs.

The Guillermon Moncada cooperative is considered an example of the government-sponsored program to promote family and community rice cultivation. It is made up of eleven cooperative members growing rice on 16.3 hectares with seed provided under the project and the possibility of expanding the farmed area, said Co-op President Jorge Cruz.

Cruz said that crops are planted using terraced fields with two harvests a year, with seed beds used to grow seedlings that are than transplanted to the fields.

The Cuban-Vietnamese project began in 2002 and is now in its second stage with an expansion to the five eastern provinces and Camaguey

Source: Radio Habana Cuba