Page 5 - Agriculture in Cambodia

six tons of unmilled rice per hectare under good conditions. Unlike local strains, however, these varieties
require a fair amount of urea and phosphate fertilizer (25,000 tons for 5,000 tons of seed), which the
government could not afford to import in the late 1980s.

Other crops

The main secondary crops in the late 1980s were maize, cassava, sweet potatoes, groundnuts, soybeans,
sesame seeds, dry beans, and rubber. According to Phnom Penh, the country produced 92,000 tons of corn
(maize), as well as 100,000 tons of cassava, about 34,000 tons of sweet potatoes, and 37,000 tons of dry
beans in 1986. In 1987 local officials urged residents of the different agricultural regions of the country to
step up the cultivation of subsidiary food crops, particularly of starchy crops, to make up for the rice deficit
caused by a severe drought.

The principal commercial crop is rubber. In the 1980s it was an important primary commodity, second only
to rice, and one of the country's few sources of foreign exchange. Rubber plantations were damaged
extensively during the war (as much as 20,000 hectares was destroyed), and recovery was very slow. In
1986 rubber production totaled about 24,500 tons (from an area of 36,000 hectares, mostly in Kampong
Cham Province), far below the 1969 prewar output of 50,000 tons (produced from an area of 50,000
hectares).

The government began exporting rubber and rubber products in 1985. A major customer was the Soviet
Union, which imported slightly more than 10,000 tons of Cambodian natural rubber annually in 1985 and in
1986. In the late 1980s, Vietnam helped Cambodia restore rubber-processing plants. The First Plan made
rubber the second economic priority, with production targeted at 50,000 tons—from an expanded cultivated
area of 50,000 hectares—by 1990.

Other commercial crops included sugarcane, cotton, and tobacco. Among these secondary crops, the First
Plan emphasized the production of jute, which was to reach the target of 15,000 tons in 1990.

Livestock

Water buffalo in the paddy fields

Animal husbandry has been an essential part of Cambodian economic life, but a part that farmers have
carried on mostly as a sideline. Traditionally, draft animals--water buffalo and oxen-- have played a crucial
role in the preparation of rice fields for cultivation. In 1979 the decreasing number of draft animals
hampered agricultural expansion. In 1967 there were 1.2 million head of draft animals; in 1979 there were
only 768,000.