Agricultural Afghanistan1

Abstract

THE Institute of Applied Botany (Leningrad) sent an expedition to Afghanistan in 1924, consisting of the director of the Institute, Prof. N. I. Vavilov, the engineer-agronomist, D. D. Bukinich, and the agronomist, V. N. Lebedev. The principal purposes of the expedition were: (1) To investigate and collect plants cultivated in the country; (2) to ascertain the regularities in the distribution of crops and their varieties over the slopes of the Hindu Kush; (3) to investigate the technique of local agriculture, the irrigation in particular; (4) to gather information as to the agricultural resources, especially as regards cotton-growing.