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About 70 percent of Kazakh land subject to desertification

Business Materials 15 February 2011 17:12 (UTC +04:00)

Kazakhstan, Astana, Feb. 15 / Trend A. Maratov /

Roughly 70 percent of Kazakhstan's territory is affected by desertification, chairman of Kazakhstan's Agency for Land Management Umirzak Uzbekov said.

"According to the qualitative characteristics, roughly 30.5 hectares of land subject to wind and water erosion in the country, of which 1.6 million hectares are arable.

He said that according to the agrochemical surveys conducted in 2000-2007, there is a problem with low humus soil all over the republic. Special attention should be paid to this problem.

"Besides the natural factors, the main cause for the reduced soil fertility is a non-use of mineral and organic fertilizers," the head of the department said.

Thus, if the amount of fertilizer used per hectare of arable land hit 19.1 kilograms in 1990, while in 2000 this index was 0.7 kg, in 2010 - 4.14 kg.

"In 2010, the interregional land inspection agency revealed more than 17,000 unused land plots in an area of about 3 million hectares," he said.

He said that the entities, who did not use the land for agricultural purposes, will be fined to the amount of 17 million tenge.

He said that the land inspections conducted 6,342 checks in 2010. The fine totaling 428.7 million tenge was imposed on violators.

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