Persia Iran

In the Persian year 1925-26 the export of rice—almost all to Russia—amounted to 61,450 standard tons; while on the Persian shore of the Gulf 20,380 tons were imported from India.

In Gilan sowing takes place in March, transplanting and pricking out in May, and after two or three hoeings harvest in August or September. In South Persia (Fars) early in April the seed is put in a wet cloth or a pit and left for some 36 days to sprout, then into a bed till the seedlings are well up where they are finally transplanted into large squares and kept regularly flooded till the end of September, when water is cut off; cutting takes place in late October and the stalks are then put under the feet of cattle for the paddy to be separated. The yield in some southern districts is given as high as 6o-fold, but is generally from 15 to 20. Prices in the south of Persia are about 26s. 8d. per cwt. for the best quality ("champa") and less than 20S. for second grades.

Other cereals grown as "summer crops" (saifi) for local con sumption are : maize (Zea mays), sown at the end of May and har vested in September: beans (Faba vulgaris) : lentils (Ervum lens) : millet or sorgo (Sorghum vulgare). Peas (Pisum, sativum) are grown as a winter crop (shitwi).

Among agricultural products for commerce are : Opium.—From 2880 cultivation greatly increased with the demand from the Far East, both landowners and peasants find ing it more profitable to put part of their corn-land under poppy (Papaver somniferum, L. var. album D.C.). It has become one of the chief methods for financing the payment of imported goods by merchants, for in the districts of production the opium season releases large sums in cash, which, passing through a number of hands—cultivator pedlars, petty merchants, brokers or land owners—till the opium reaches the merchant and is paid for by hills on the ports or abroad, enable purchases of all kinds of goods to be made and impart activity to trade. The export of the prepared drug weighed 770,516 lb. in 1913-14: 875,166 lb. in 1914-15 and, after falling to 255,697 lb. in 1921-22, rose again to 660,647 lb. in 1922-23,2,077,290 lb. in 1924-25 and 1,130,057 lb. in 1925-26. (The prepared drug includes gunjideh gum, and other solvents used for adulterating opium to the percentage of morphine desired.) This represented an export invoice value of

£698,416 in 1913-14, L1,565,121 in 1925-26. The crude sap com ing under government excise control in 1923-24 weighed 1,340,000 lb., but the Persian Government estimated that total production in that year was not less than 1,950,00o lb. Though a proportion is doubtless smuggled, consumption in the country mainly ac counts for this difference, between 5 and io per cent of the popula tion in the interior being reckoned as addicts to opium smoking.

Cotton

(Gossykium herbaceum) is grown, in nearly all prov inces of Persia for home consumption (and the total production has been estimated as high as 30,00o tons), but for export pre Isfahan and Yazd provinces. In the year 1925-26, 17,728 tons, of which eleven-twelfths to Russia, one-twelfth to British India, were exported. It is too short in the staple, too weak and uneven in quality, and contains too many impurities owing to the ab sence of ginning machinery, to find a market in western or central Europe. An American variety, acclimatized in Asiatic Russia, has been introduced to Khorassan of recent years, and experiments have been made since 1925 in Fars with American cotton accli matized in Iraq. It is sown after the danger of frost is considered past, i.e., from the end of March to early May, flooded by surface irrigation water about six times, and picked from October to No vember, according to the climate of the province.

Dried and fresh fruits form an important export and source of wealth to the country. In the year March 1925-26 the Cus toms gave the total weight as 88,822 tons, of a total approximate value of £1,762,090. Of this Russia took 26,37o tons of dried raisins, 4,094 tons of dried apricots, 2,752 tons of oranges and limes, 1,853 tons of almonds and other nuts, 3,102 tons of other fresh or dry fruit ; while 43,709 tons of dates were exported, from Khuzistan province almost entirely, to the British Empire and Protectorates, and 2,280 tons of almonds and pistachio nuts. Scientific fruit-growers in Europe think that the parents of many of the cultivated fruits of Europe are to be found in north Azer baijan and the Caucasus region ; but little or no attempt through the centuries has been made to improve stocks by grafting.