Droughts have hit 19,177 hectares of rice fields in Central Java causing harvest failures on a total of 3,589 hectares of the paddies, ANTARA quoted a provincial food crop official as saying. The droughts had hit rice fields in 24 districts, damaging rice plants aged between 10 days and 90 days, Siti Narwanti, head of the Food Crops and Horticullture Protection Center of Central Java's Food Crops and Horticulture Office, said here Tuesday. She said the droughts had hit plants on rain-fed rice fields where farmers had actually been suggested to grow food crops other than rice during the current dry season. The drought-hit districts included Semarang, Grobogan, Sragen, Karanganyar, Sukoharjo, Wonogiri, Boyolali, Pekalongan, Brebes, Tegal, Pemalang, Banyumas, Purbalingga, Cilapcap, Banjarnegara, Pati, Blora, Rembang, Purworejo, Kebumen and Wonosobo. Harvest failures occurred in Sragen, Rembang, Semarang, Banyumas and Cilacap. According to Siti, the harvest failures occurred only on 0.74 percent (480,000 hectares) of rice fields in Central Java in June, 2008. Other rice fields were irrigated with water from wells and rivers in an effort to save them until harvest time, she said. Besides rice fields, droughts also hit 667 hectares of corn fields but the crop was safe to harvest, she said, adding that as the corn was still too young on being harvested, it would only be used as fodder.
