OREANDA-NEWS. August 22, 2008. The harvest campaign in Belarus is drawing to a close. About 7% of the total cropping area is left to be harvested.

The Brest and Gomel oblasts have already harvested all the grain crops, only 3% of the area under buckwheat and 2.5% of the area under millet are left to be cropped. The Grodno, Minsk and Mogilev oblasts have to harvest 4.6%, 7.5% and 6.1% of grain crops correspondingly. The Vitebsk oblast has to crop 16.4% of the total area.

As of August 22, the gross grain harvest in Belarus was 8,250.000 tonnes vs. 6, 899.000 tonnes in 2007.

The highest harvest is in the Minsk oblast: 2,121.000 tonnes. The Grodno oblast has cropped 1,638.000 tonnes. The Brest oblast has harvested 1,263.000 tonnes, Gomel 1,045.000 tonnes. The Mogilev oblast has cropped 1,215.000 tonnes; the Vitebsk oblast is approaching 1 million tonnes.

The agricultural enterprises of Belarus have been commissioned with the task to help the individuals harvest the crops at their household plots, finish delivery of grain stipulated in the government's grain procurement contract. Apart from that, it is necessary to accelerate the preparation of the soil for the autumn sowing campaign. The agricultural enterprises of the northern regions are to launch the sowing of soilage winter crops on August 25.