Bulgaria's granary is sounding the alarm: We have a drought for the second year

In Dobruja, the wheat and barley harvest has ended. Because of the high temperatures, corn and sunflower harvests are expected to start earlier and harvesters will be in the fields within a week. However, the state of the crops gives farmers reason to expect much lower yields than usual.

Nedyalko Statev cultivates 8,000 decares of land in the village of Pop Grigorovo, 15% of which is planted with corn and sunflower. Due to the lack of winter moisture and economic rains, low yields are expected from both crops.

"For the first year out of the last five years, we enter the spring season with moisture around 60%, which is extremely low, no winter moisture storage. Since then there have been spring rains, but they are simply not enough to feed the crops. And the other most important moment, especially with corn, is rain during flowering, which was lacking this year. Hence the result we see on the field – small cobs and not in every plant”, the farmer Nedyalko Statev commented to bTV.

The last significant rainfall in the area was at the end of June. Therefore, Statev expects yields to be at least half lower than normal – about 300 kg for corn and about 150-200 kg. for the sunflower.

"The normal average yield for sunflower is about 280 to 300 kilograms, almost double, and for corn, the concept is much more flexible, but let's say 700-750 is a good yield,”, he specifies.

This is the second dry year in a row for Dobruja. But now the temperatures are also high, experts say.

"There were always hot days – 36°-38° but that was for 2 to 4 days max and now we have weeks of over 34°-35°. This high temperature is combined with the lack of vegetation precipitation, which has a very negative effect on the crops, not only on sunflowers, it is worse with corn,“ explains Associate Professor Galin Georgiev, a breeder at the Dobrudzhan Agricultural Institute.

His prediction is that there will be fields with zero yield as well. According to Associate Professor Georgiev, a state policy is needed to build irrigation systems for farmers.