PINAR DEL RIO, Cuba.- A Cuba-Viet Nam cooperation program to obtain seeds and to organize and boost the production of rice will soon be implemented in 40,000 hectares of the Caribbean nation, including the westernmost Cuban province of Pinar del Rio.

Elizabeth Cristo, a member of the project and genetic improvement researcher at the Experimental Station of Los Palacios in Pinar del Rio, told ACN that 100 hectares of land in the eastern part of this province are currently being prepared for this initiative, which aims at comparing the Cuban and Vietnamese rice growing technologies in order to foster the best techniques and results.

The specialist noted that the main differences regarding technical norms in Cuba and Viet Nam have to do with the transplantation of seedlings, the way to sow them, and the fertilization cycles and distribution.

Bilateral cooperation in this area began in 2002 in the eastern Cuban province of Granma and it later extended to territories like Pinar del Rio, which has one of the biggest agro-industrial rice complexes of the country and an Experimental Station that produces the majority of the rice varieties cultivated in Cuba.

This project, as others under way, will contribute to an annual 14% increase of the rice production in the Caribbean country.

According to press reports, Cuba imports more than 400,000 tons of rice per year, which represents 60% of the total amount consumed by the Cuban population.