The Steppes of Middle Asia: Post-1991 Agricultural and Rangeland Adjustment

ABSTRACT Middle Asia is submitted to arid and semiarid cold winter Mediterranean climate with lower precipitation variability than in other Mediterranean regions. It harbors the Irano-Turanian flora closely related to the Mediterranean basin. It encloses the newly independent countries (i.e., Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and southern Kazakhstan) that had to produce their own food and feed within their national territory after the Soviet system breakup in 1991. Rangelands cover most of these countries (80–95% of total agricultural areas) with little arable land (5–20%) and permanent crops (0.1–2.9%), the last two being mostly irrigated, except in Kazakhstan. After 1991, Middle Asian agriculture deteriorated due to disorganization and ensuing slow reform generating a breakdown in farming practices, fertilizer use, and crop yield until 1995–1997, and then picking up again. This revival was achieved by reassigning cotton- and rice-irrigated land to irrigated wheat cropping, and also to rai...