São Paulo – Brazilian cotton and soy seeds are sprouting in Sudanese land. Three weeks ago, Brazilian technicians planted the first 500 hectares in an experimental field – located in the south of the country, 400 kilometres away from the capital, Khartoum – using seeds, technology, handling and agricultural equipment from Brazil.
As informed by ANBA in March this year, Brazil and Sudan signed an agricultural agreement that may increase by up to three times the current cotton production volume in the Arab country, currently at 80,000 tonnes per year.
The agreement was signed by the Cotton Growers Association of the State of Mato Grosso (Ampa) and the Sudanese minister of Agriculture, Elzubeir Bashir Taha, during a visit of a delegation of growers from the Brazilian state to the Arab country.
“The experimental field is the result of a partnership between a local Arab capital group and the Pinesso group, based in Mato Grosso do Sul,” said businessman Paulo Hegg, who is coordinating the work.
According to Hegg, the idea is to return to the Arab country in September to see which types of seeds have adapted themselves better to local weather. "It only rains four months a year in the region, so we have already planted a small irrigated five-hectare area so as to be able to evaluate the results in both areas," he said.
The next planting should cover approximately 10,000 hectares and should be carried out in June 2011. "The region is still being analyzed, but the goal is to plant an area of 100,000 hectares in three years," said Hegg.
Aside from the experimental field, the group will create an Agricultural Research Institute in Sudan, in partnership with the Mato Grosso State Cotton Institute (IMA) and the Agricultural Researh Corporation (ARC), based in the African country.
"The basis for development is adaptation to the local climate and land. We have just received a Sudanese professor who visited various cotton plantations and attended meetings with Brazilian scientists from the IMA, who will travel together to Sudan in late September, to get to know the site and structure out the institute," explained Hegg.
According to him, the institute will be funded by the government of Sudan and the estimate is that around 5 million euros. "The most interesting thing about this project is that we are helping Sudan to develop its agriculture, and to modernize and increase its agricultural productivity," he said.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
