Page:Niger Delta Ecosystems- the ERA Handbook, 1998.djvu/142

The Resources of the Niger Delta: Agriculture

These are described in Chapter 6.4.5. The deposits are farmed for quick annual crops of cassava (which may spend 18 months in the ground elsewhere), sugar-cane and vegetables.

Rice provides a good and equitable rural income. In most respects paddy-rice farming appears to be sustainable because annual flooding brings in nutrients, but it has all the potential problems of monoculture and rice rust (a fungus similar to wheat rust) on a small farm near Anyama.

Such as Risonpalm and Niger Delta Basin Authority projects.

13.3.2 RICE AND OIL PALM ARE THE KEY CROPS FOR THE AGRICULTURAL FUTURE OF THE FRESH-WATER ECOZONE

There is no doubt that rice and oil palm are the key to the future agricultural productivity of the Niger Delta. Improved strains of rice already yield over 4000 kg of milled rice per hectare in Cameroon, compared with something in the order of less than 500 kg/ha around Anyama. Paddy-Rice culture is described in more detail in the following section on agriculture in the Brackish-Water ecozone. 140