economy

The DPRK, which is bounded by the sea on the east and west, abounds in tidal flats.

Therefore, tideland reclamation has long been carried out on a large scale, the area of reclaimed tideland under cultivation increasing with each passing day.

Recently, The Pyongyang Times reporter Kim Rye Yong visited the Onchon branch of the Rice Institute under the Academy of Agricultural Science, which produces high and safe yields despite extreme weather and various soil salinity conditions.

The branch is located on Unha Plain, reclaimed tideland on the west coast of Korea.

The reporter met Jong Myong Sun, PhD and head of the branch, who told her about why it was built on the plain.

“With deep insight into the importance of solving the problem of seed in farming on reclaimed tideland, President Kim Il Sung saw to it that an institute specializing in research for a rice strain resistant to salinity was established on Unha Plain in March 45 years ago,” said Jong.

Jong went on to say that in the last period of his great life, the President was so pleased to see a good rice strain bred by a researcher that he said the researcher satisfied his desire and had the new rice strain named after the researcher.

Looking round the branch together with the head, the reporter was surprised at its wonderful scenery.

Several buildings of marked modern beauty which is flawless in terms of architectural beauty stand in good order, surrounded by hundreds of fruit trees and flowering shrubs, like in a park.

When the reporter said the institute looked like an advanced central-level agricultural science research institute, Jong said with deep emotion that the branch turned into a modern seed breeding base equipped with sophisticated apparatuses under the meticulous care of General Secretary Kim Jong Un, who attaches importance to farming on reclaimed tideland.

The work style of the researchers changed completely after they keenly realized the intention of the Workers’ Party of Korea which stresses the need to attach importance to farming on reclaimed tideland and give priority to seed improvement in order to bring about a decisive turn in grain production in the country with limited arable land, she added.

Though staffed with some ten researchers, the branch has bred seven high-yielding rice strains highly resistant to salinity over the past several years and introduced them into dozens of thousands of hectares of fields in different areas including those on the west coast of Korea. 

The reporter listened to the detailed explanations about the characteristics of newly bred rice seeds at the achievements showroom of the branch, for example, a rice strain which ensures a per-hectare yield of over 8 tons from reclaimed tideland with low soil salinity, the other one highly effective in increasing yields from such land with high soil salinity or newly reclaimed tideland and a tasty functional rice strain strong in pharmacological action.

In particular, the reporter was attracted by rice strains which can ensure high per-hectare yield from tideland from the first year after its reclamation.

Then, the reporter went to the bioengineering laboratory to meet with researchers engrossed in research for using a molecular marker technique to select good individuals. They said with confidence that next year they would be able to breed salinity-resistant rice seeds, their intended target.

While going together with the reporter to a test research field by an 80hp tractor, Ri Un Chol, a section chief of the branch, said that they ensure the operation of tractors for 250 days a year by repairing and keeping the vehicles well and that they intend to make an automatic manure loader, adding that it would increase the proportion of the farm work done by machines by over 70 percent.

The test research field covered with an irrigation system like a net was nice enough to be called a model in irrigation system for reclaimed tideland.

The reporter could not see a satisfactory scene of golden ears of grain swaying on the field as it was just after the end of harvesting, but the sight of the branch’s researchers steadily continuing research with unusual attachment to their job enabled her to picture the bright prospect of farming on reclaimed tideland.