Guantanamo.- Since last Wednesday, just a day after the rains stopped, university students and professors have been leaving for Maisí and other municipalities to support the coffee harvest, one of the most pressing agricultural activities of the moment.
Teudis Limeres, the regional deputy general delegate for Agriculture, stated that the recovery strategy also prioritizes the collection of products for the population, such as cassava, which is prone to spoil due to excessive humidity in the fields.
Other urgent needs relate to the supply of bean and other grain seeds to producers who lost their crops to these plantations, mainly in the Caujerí Valley and the municipality of Guantánamo.
The subdelegate emphasized the urgency to recover tomato and other vegetable corps in the areas damaged, especially in the Caujerí Valley, to take advantage of the optimum time to plant for these crops.
Furthermore, conditions are being created to begin land preparation as soon as soil moisture allows, in order to catch up on cold-weather plantings.
The rains also obstructed access to cattle trails, which affected milk collection in some areas, Teudis reported, adding that, as much as possible, efforts are being made to concentrate feed in places where it can be transported.
According to reports as of last Wednesday morning, in the province 357 hectares of crops (164 hectares of grain crops, 123 hectares of root crops, 60.6 hectares of vegetables, and 10 hectares of fruit trees), were damaged. The municipalities of San Antonio del Sur, Guantánamo, and Yateras, reported the greatest damage, in that order, as well as 10 hectares of fruit trees correspond to papaya crops in the provincial capital.
The rains, however, benefited the province’s reservoirs, ensuring water for the population and agricultural irrigation. They also provided abundant soil moisture in much of the area, which will benefit future crops.
