China's western most Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the biggest producer of quality long-staple cotton in the country, announced to raise per-hectare yield while slightly reducing sown acreage of the cash crop next year.

Xiong Huiyin, vice-chairman of the autonomous regional government, said the cotton sown acreage would be set at approximately 1.07 million hectares in 2005, down from about 1.11 million hectares planted this year.

"We hope to attain the goal of reaping in 1.8 million tons of cotton next year, therefore, greater efforts should be made to apply advanced growing technologies on an extensive scale, including high-density, high-yield planting skills, the efficient sprinkle irrigation method to cotton plantations so that the per-hectare cotton output will increase by five kg at least," noted the vice chairman.

According to Xiong, Xinjiang is expected to reap a record high of 1.75 million tons of cotton this year, 150,000 tons more than that of last year.

Source: Xinhua