Minister: 60% of land area was involved in crop rotation in libearted territories

To date, the Azerbaijan Mine Action Agency (ANAMA) has cleared a total of 44,731 hectares of agricultural land of mines and unexploded ordnance in the liberated territories of Azerbaijan, and the certificates and maps of 27,783 hectares have been submitted to the Ministry of Agriculture, the Minister of Agriculture, Majnun Mammadov, said at the public hearing held on November 4 at the parliament themed “Tackling the Threat of Landmines: The Impact of Explosives on the Ecosystem," Report informs.

According to him, the process in this direction is being intensively continued.

"As a result of this cooperation, 10,000 hectares of land in the 2020–2021 economic year, 50,000 hectares in the 2021–2022 economic year, and 72,000 hectares in the 2022–2023 economic year were brought into crop rotation with strict adherence to safety rules. This is only 60% of the potential areas. Apparently, 40% of the land area has not yet been involved in crop rotation due to the reasons mentioned.

Mine contamination in these areas is so high that incidents are inevitable despite all safety measures. According to ANAMA, 10 mine explosions occurred during agricultural activities in the liberated territories, as a result of which 8 people were injured and 7 people lost their lives. 6 pieces of agricultural equipment became unusable and broke down,” Mammadov said.

The minister emphasized that at the same time, the invaders had turned the agricultural land into a battlefield for many years and seriously damaged its fertility: “The monitoring of the land resources of those areas revealed that trenches and fortifications with a length of 2,000 km and an area of about 4,200 hectares were built, and these lands were subjected to severe anthropogenic erosion. The cultivated land contaminated with mines and unexploded ordnance at a high level is about 5,000 hectares.”