Myanmar Field Survey (3-1)

Working Farmers and Livestock in Myanmar

Takashi Kurosaki

Last revision: October 11, 2002



I visited Chin State, near Indian border in September 2002. Here in hilly areas, villagers keep Nanao or Gaur, so-called Indian Bisons as their most important asset. Nanao is a semi-domesticated cattle. Its face seems to be a mixture of bullock and buffaloes. Its meat is delicious. Villagers take care of Nanaos, leaving them on pasture forest, giving salt, sending a veterinarian, etc. But the villagers are not yet able to use the animal for work. (In this sense, this photo does not show a "working" animal.)

A Lower Myanmar village in January. You can see paddy ready for harvesting in the front. It is "Monsoon paddy". Over there, farmers are busy transplanting paddy. It is "Summer paddy". This paddy field is deep and some farmers grow even jute as a pre-monsonn crop.

I found a large reclamation project near the village above. The company hires farmers to take care of paddy. Two buffaloes are preparing paddy fields.

With more focus, you can see that these buffaloes belong to the swamp variety. More information on buffaloes are available on Working Bovines in South Asia.

In January, Upper Myanmar villages are very dry if irrigation is limited. In this photo taken in Magwe Division, a farmer is coming back to his home in a bullock cart. Myanmar bullock carts are beautiful with a curve formed by vertical bars to maintain luggage.

In a different village in Magwe Division, farmers are harvesting the final produce of pigeon pea. In this field, relay-cropping of sesame and pigeon pea was adopted. After this harvest, fields are cultivated by bullocks and left dry until the next monsoon comes after half a year.

The same field with more focus on bullocks. Here, castrated bullocks are used in cultivation. Myanmar plows have a box-shaped plow body, which is different from the one found in South Asian livestock. In this sense also, Myanmar belongs to South-East Asia.

Even in January in Upper Myanmar, irrigation makes agriculture possible. In this photo, a lady farmer is irrigating maize crops. You can compare this photo with irrigation in South Asia.


Cats in Rural Myanmar@ Working Farmers and Livestock in Myanmar@ Rice Growing Village in Lower Myanmar@ Floating Vegetable Plots on Inle Lake, Shan@ Highland Vegetable Village in Shan

Back to English Index Page