Havana, Cuba.- Cuba is working to improve the efficiency of the National Soil Improvement and Conservation Program, which this year includes investments raised to 58.6 million pesos (equal in USD to the official exchange rate), experts of the sector said here today.
The Institute of Soil director, Luis Gomez, told Prensa Latina that the aim is to improve the mechanisms capable of knowing more precisely how much of this productive resource is lost each year in order to assess the efficiency and impact of the Program.
The institution he leads has 34 researchers and 248 workers, a main office in Havana and four base units in provinces of Pinar del Rio (west), Cienfuegos (center) and Camagüey and Guantanamo (east).
According to Gomez, who is also the president of the Cuban Society of Soil Science, in 2018 the entity has among its priorities to continue adapting and mitigating climate change and introducing principles of conservation agriculture.
Luis Gomez, a microbiologist by profession, also cited as key tasks the contribution to improving ground floor, main mission of the center, to increase carbon capture, the biological nitrogen fixation and the solubility of phosphorus.
Also on the list are the greatest use of the potential of the varieties and the introduction of bio-fertilizer technologies, on the occasion of the celebration in Havana of an international congress on soil, the specialist said.
Today’s congress includes the analysis of no less than 60 papers in symposia and commissions, related, among others, with the sustainable management of soil, bioproducts in agriculture, computerization and integrated management, as well as the use of agro-ecological management of crops.
About 260 experts from Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, Cuba, Guatemala, Belize, Argentina, Spain and other countries are participating in the event, which will conclude tomorrow.
During the first day of the event yesterday, a symposium was held on the application of nuclear techniques in the sphere, in which a dozen papers were debated.