Phongsaly: slash-and-burn cultivation practiced on 465 ha

(KPL) Slash-and-burn cultivation area has been reduced significantly over ten years and the current number of this kind of production area is 465 ha.

Meanwhile, highland rice farmland has been reduced from 28,000 ha in 1990 to 4,800 ha this year.

Over 5,500 families in the province stopped practicing slash-and-burn cultivation over the past five years.

In 2004, the provincial authorities began a land allocation project to facilitate people’s agricultural production, fixed farming and stable occupation and this move had contributed to the reduction of highland rice farmland, according to the Agriculture and Forestry Service of Phongsaly. The service said last week that the current size of highland rice farmland was 14,000 ha.

Over 476,000 ha of land has been allocated by local authorities for the improvement of living condition of people in 317 villages.

The authorities of the province releases a policy on stable occupation creation for the local people to enable them to stop nomadic agriculture and encourage them to pay more attention to cattle husbandry, the fixed farming of cash crops, industrial tree plantation and promote the investment of both domestic and foreign investors.

Investors are highly encouraged to invest in rice plantation, tea production, rubber plantation and animal raising.

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