The Director General in Eastern Equatoria State Ministry of Agriculture is advising farmers to use intercropping methods of cultivation this year to avoid complete crop failure in the field.
Anna Itwari Felix explains that it is good to grow different kinds of crops in one farm so that when one fails, the other one can produce good yield, Radio Emmanuel reported.
According to her, when farmers grow cereal crops like maize and intercrop with legumes like beans it will improve the soil fertility.
“We also advise that we don’t grow the same crops in the same field throughout the seasons, it is good to grow one crop and intercrop with the other. When we are growing cereal likes sorghum maize it is good to bring in peas crops or legume you put alongside so that we have a lot of organic manure in place”, Itwari explains.
The director-general adds that in this year, the ministry will embark on tree planting in order to change the appearance of Eastern Equatoria State.
Itwari reveals that one million tree seedlings will be planted in all counties of Eastern Equatoria with hopes of planting more in the next three years.
“This year we are going to change our environment seriously by embarking on tree growing, we want to grow one million trees for the whole of Eastern Equatoria and we are starting this year, but the next three years we should have already grown so many trees, so many fruits trees, so many nuts so that the cycle of our food insecurity is broken down so that we have a great food basket beside our maize, sorghum and other cereals we also require other food crops. We have the root crops”, she says.