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Sesame and by Products
Niger seeds
Spices
- coriander, dry ginger, turmeric (finger,
powder), red chilli, onions
and
others.
Rice
Timber - squares, planks, parquet, scantling (planed & others) logs etc.
RattanThe agriculture
cultivation of the lowland is still the main
means of income in Myanmar.
For the wet form of
agriculture rice-cultivation, the land must be
lightly flooded for a good part of the season ;
A good agriculture
season is one in which a large proportion of the
fields have water enough for an early start and
in which the rainfall is steady, not leaving the
surface to dry up by a long break in the rain
nor deluging the soil at other times.
 All the agriculture
alluvial land of favorable elevation and quality
is laid out in level rice-fields. Where the
rainfall is ample-fifty inches and upwards
portions of the diluvia land’s soil can be
utilized in the same way by merely saving the
surface-water.
In agriculture
regions of lighter rainfall, in a few
localities, such land is brought under rice by
help of irrigation and if need be by terracing
as well. The agriculture rice-fields are
bordered by low turfy mounds (kazin) about a
cubit high, to keep in the water.
These regular
rice-lands form large parts of Myanmar, the rest
being practically irreclaimable, mainly
mountain.
Other areas of the
Myanmar agriculture alluvial plains (kwin) are flooded
from three to ten feet deep in the rains. They
are full with elephant-grass (kaing) and studded
through with silk-cotton trees and a few other
species. The lowest levels in the kwin form
shallow lagoons which dry up in the hot season.
Dry-season crops like sugar-cane (which is also
grown on the wet system), maize, lentils, and
vegetables for a limited market—are obtained in
the kaing.
Myanmar was once the
rice-mart of the world but communists and
military ruined the country .
The wet or staple
agriculture cultivation of the whole Myanmar
begins between June and August, as soon as the
grass-sod which has formed on the rice-fields in
the by-season and which has served for pasture
in the interval has got thoroughly water-logged.
The Myanmar
agriculture soil is then turned, about six
inches deep, with a plough bearing a shoe of
bronze or iron. Where elephants are available a
large ton is used which does the work of four
ploughs. The clods left by the plough arc broken
fine, and the wet soil worked into slush by
herds of buffaloes driven round and round in the
fields. If there are not enough cattle, the
plough-clods are worked down with harrows drawn
by buffaloes or oxen.
A rotary implement
is coming into use to prepare the clods for the
harrow. There is very little open grass-land in
the moist region. Unless the scrub which springs
up is cut, the land soon relapses into jungle.
For the above
Myanmar agriculture operations cattle are
needful to the cultivator, though he makes
little use of the manure and does not use the
milk at all. The cattle are only used for
draught, and very little care is bestowed on
breeding.
During a great part
of the Myanmar agriculture year there is no work
for the buffaloes, as they are of little service
for wheel-draught ; then they are left to roam
at large. They frequent the streams and lagoons,
where they are followed by egrets and crows,
which pick the worms out of the mud as the
buffaloes turn over in their wallow.
While Myanmar agriculture
crops are standing, cattle have to be kept in pens at
night, and herds have to watch them by day. This work is
d one by children from twelve years upwards. The
buffalo-pen is made near the house, if possible in a
water-logged spot where the animals can wallow in the
mud, which protects them from -the bites of gad-flies
and mosquitoes. Where there is no wallow, smoky fires
have to be made to keep the insects away.
In certain Myanmar
agriculture localities of the delta cattle have to be
protected with curtains. In the arid region fodder has
to be grown for the cattle, but goats find pasture and
are kept for their milk.
The Myanmar agriculture
rice-fields first ploughed and ready are sown
broad-cast for nurseries (fiyo-gin). A month later,
when the rice-plants are about a foot high, they are
taken up and transplanted into the prepared fields, a
span apart. The roots are simply pressed down into the
soft slush with the fingers or with a forked stick. The
acre produces thirty to eighty bushels of grain,
according to soil and season.
The Myanmar agriculture ripe
corn stands three to five feet high, and so thick as to
keep down tares. Unlike hill-rice which requires several
heavy weedings in the season, the wet rice-fields need
no care beyond that of regulating the water-supply.
Where there is drainage for the water, it is allowed to
stand only a few inches high on the ground.
 As tee grain ripens, the
soil is allowed to dry. If there is a head of water
available during the rains, channels are led to the
fields to keep the supply equal. If the supply is near
and only at a slightly lower level than the fields, the
effects of drought are counteracted by various devices
such as the ka-hnwe.
Running water at too low a
level to lay on to the fields is utilized by help of a
bamboo water-wheel (jut), or if the water be still, the
wheel is driven by ox-gear. In some parts, Myanmar
agriculture rice is planted on the river banks as the
floods begin to subside.
The varieties of rice, of
which there are many, suited to different soils and
modes of cultivation, take from three to five months to
mature. The Myanmar agriculture harvest of the crops is
from October to December, according to the variety and
time of planting out. When the grain turns yellow,
flights of parakeets and other birds descend on the
crops, from which they have to be scared till
reaping-time. Bamboo clappers are worked by bast lines
in a radius of a hundred yards from the watcher's hut.
Where there is an abundance of pasture for cattle, the
stubble is left very high and is burned where it stands,
to manure the ground.
But if straw is needed
for fodder the corn is cut close to the ground, having
first been laid by pressing it down with bamboos, which
makes it easier.
For reaping the Myanmar
agriculture villagers cooperate. But in the plains of
the delta, where cultivation has extended so greatly,
there is not labour enough on the spot to reap the crop.
Harvest laborers come down from Myanmar proper.
The sheaves are left to dry
for a day in the sun and then gathered into garbs. These
are piled on a dry field into a circular heap some three
feet high, and broad enough for a herd of buffaloes to
tramp round upon and tread the grain off the ear, to
which it is attached by a slender petiole.
Another way is to pile the
garbs in a high crescent-shaped heap, round the central
space of which four to six head of cattle are made to
travel abreast and tread the garbs which are cast down
from above. The grain keeps best in the husk and is
stored in bins of bamboo wattle smeared with clay.
The covering of the
rice-grain is a strong adherent husk like that of
barley, but without any beard. Rice in the husk is
called Saba (Engl. paddy).
Leaning the coarse yellow
husk is a shell of bran, and beneath that a delicate
white pellicle. The two outer coverings have to be
removed and the inner one preserved. " Cargo rice,"
which forms the bulk of the mill produce, is three parts
rice, simply husked, and one part paddy. The mixture
bears the transport better than white rice.
Myanmar’s agriculture clean
the rice according to daily need. This is done either by
simple pounding or by first husking the grain in a
wooden mill (kyeissiin), and then pounding it to get off
the bran. The mortar is of hard wood, with a hard wood
pounder as heavy as the arm can wield ; or else the
pounder is mounted in a tilting-beam for foot-power.
Chaff and bran are separately winnowed out with sieves
and trays (sagchv) of bamboo, and in exposed places by
the help of the wind also. For wholesale husking, the
native mill is composed of two strong wicker-work
cylinders made solid with clay, in which are embedded
upright staves of hard wood As the mill wears clown, the
layers of wood keep above the clay like the layers of
enamel in a herbivore's tooth, maintaining a rough
surface for work. In the early clays of the export
trade, rice was husked for shipping in this way. The
separation of the chaff is done with a machine copied
from our farmyard and now manufactured.
Cleaning the rice with the
hand-mill, cakes and sweets, rice is ground with water
in first soaking, it is passed through the mill fluid,
which is strained and used while fresh.
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