2010-03-31 13:35

BEIJING - China's grain production would not be badly affected by the drought in southwest China, Liu Ning, vice minister of water resources, said at a press conference here Wednesday.

China's major grain production bases lay in the northern areas, and the arable land in the drought-hit southwest regions stand at 344 million mu, or 22.93 million hectares, of which, 260 million mu, or 17.3 million hectares, is used for grain production, accounting for only 16 percent of the nation's total, according to Liu.

As of the end of 2008, China had about 1.83 billion mu of arable land.