On August 12, Turkmenistan launched sowing of winter crops. Farmers of Dashoguz province were the first to start sowing crops for the harvest of 2010. Grain growers of other provinces of the country will begin sowing simultaneously on 19 August.

As the State News Agency of Turkmenistan (TDH) said, the sowing area of the northern region will, as in previous years, amount to 180 thousand hectares of land. Local grain growers prefer local varieties of wheat such as "Sahrai", "Dzhuvan" and "Yloten-1", as well as "Bat'ko" and "Yubileynaya-100", which was brought from Stavropol (Russia) and proved good for the soil climatic conditions of the region. Under the state order, the Dashoguz province is expected to harvest 300 thousand tons of wheat.

The technical fleet of the agrarian province has about 1000 ploughing tractors and tractor-cultivators, as well as more than 380 grain seeders, including 105 Belarus-82.1 tractors that have recently arrived in Turkmenistan within the framework of a long-term contract with the Minsk Tractor Plant. New tractor-cultivators of Belarus-80 and Belarus-82.1 brand keep arriving into the country these days.

On the occasion of the beginning of the winter wheat crop sowing campaign, a seminar was held in the farmer union of Sadulla Rozmetov in S.A. Niyazov district which was attended by leaders of provincial and district administrations, units of the Turkmengallaonumleri and Turkmenobahyzmyt associations, the Turkmenstandartlary State Service, agro specialists, machine operators and grain growers. There was held an exhibition of agricultural machinery and products of the processing industry of the agro-industrial complex.

According to the TDH, the current campaign is particularly important for Turkmen farmers. "The campaign results will be a peculiar test in terms of the successful implementation of the second phase of agrarian reform, started in spring this year, designed to bring a strategic sector of the national economy to new levels, the TDH said.