ENG-1964 — Page 85

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PRIMARY PRODUCTION

one-crop paddy in brackish water. Due to drought there was a fall in paddy production in 1964 and, with a milling average of 68 per cent, the estimated crop was 8,210 metric tons of polished rice; at an average wholesale price of $54 a picul the crop was valued at $7,360,000. In a normal year the average yield of paddy from an acre of two-crop land is about 1.3 metric tons, but with seed of approved varieties, good irrigation and the use of fertilizers, production may reach 1.8 metric tons on average land, and over two metric tons on better soils. The first crop is sown into the nurseries in early March, transplanted in April and harvested in June and July. Second crop seedlings are nursed in June for planting out by the end of July and the crop is harvested during October and early November.

Farmers are making more use of varieties recommended by the Agriculture and Fisheries Department as resistant to blast, the disease of paddy caused by the fungus Piricularia Oryzae. The department also selects seeds within varieties and a limited amount of such improved seed is distributed to selected growers each year to be multiplied by them for further distribution. Traditionally the manurial treatment of rice consists of adding only very small dressings of dry animal manure; but the use of balanced artificial fertilizers is becoming increasingly important.

VEGETABLE MARKETING ORGANIZATION

1

Almost all the vegetables grown in Hong Kong are sold through a marketing scheme which was set up in 1946 on the lines of the successful fish marketing scheme. The present Vegetable Marketing Organization operates under the Agricultural Products (Marketing) Ordinance, 1952 which provides for the appointment of a Director of Marketing (the Director, Agriculture and Fisheries Department) who is made a corporation sole with power to acquire and dispose of property and use the assets of the organization for the develop- ment and encouragement of vegetable farming. It provides also for a Marketing Advisory Board composed of unofficials to assist the organization. The controls imposed by the ordinance, however, apply only to the New Territories and Kowloon area, for there is little vegetable cultivation on Hong Kong Island.