The Cultivation and Status Change of Millet in Guizhou Province since Ming Dynasty
The Miao and the Yao ethnic minorities in Guizhou consider millet to be a primary food source.It is cultivated using slash-and-burn farming and forest-food intercropping techniques.Since the bureaucratization of native officers in the period from 1726 to 1736,the government encouraged hill farming,with the planting scope of millet gradually expanded.By the time foreign high-yielding crops such as maize and sweet potatoes were in-troduced,millet cultivation had declined significantly.It was then employed as a supplementary food source in disaster relief efforts.Millet planting in Guizhou has played a great role in alleviating famine and improving ag-ricultural structure.By organizing the literature and data statistics in a systematic manner and conducting a cross-comparison of the historical documents from different periods,the article may contribute to a better under-standing of the history of millet in Guizhou.
万方数据
维普
