Efforts for Development of Pomiculture.

The Pomiculture Institute under the Academy of Agricultural Science is producing findings conducive to developing the pomiculture of the country.

In the past, it has registered over 300 varieties of fruits as the national species and developed the methods for cultivation of dwarf apple trees and close planting of pear trees and established a fertilizing system for providing perfect nutrition to fruit trees. It also solved many sci-tech problems, including the method for pest control of fruit trees.

Its researchers opened up a prospect for cultivating apple, pear and plum trees in the northern alpine areas. It laid a foundation for mass-producing virus-free fruit saplings by means of tissue culture and developed the techniques of selecting and cultivating grain varieties for producing high-grade wine.

They are intensifying the research to solve sci-tech problems for putting fruit farming on a scientific, modern and intensive basis.

They are supplying breeder’s stock fruit saplings of superior strains to breeding farms and conducting the research for cultivating avocado in keeping with the conditions of the country.

They are also directing efforts to breeding new varieties with various resistance and functions and studying the advanced methods for raising saplings, shaping and trimming.

Based on the evaluation of the fertility of soil in orchards by means of satellite image interpretation, they are promoting the work to put distribution and cultivation of various fruit trees on a more scientific basis.

The institute is giving sci-tech guidance to the Taedonggang Combined Fruit Farm and other fruit producers.

The institute has set up over ten forecast bases in all provinces to regularly investigate and inform the growth conditions of fruits trees, and incidence of pests and the measures for their extermination. It is also providing through networks such services as lectures and real-time questions and answers about seasonable farming techniques to the fruit producing units.

Vice-director Kang Hak Chol said: It’s our goal to achieve the richest harvest by distributing the most suitable varieties to the most suitable soil in all fruit farms across the country.