<P> Agriculture in Central Asia provides a brief regional overview of agriculture in the five contiguous states of former Soviet Central Asia--Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan . Two other countries that are sometimes classified as Central Asian--Afghanistan and Mongolia--are not included in this overview because of their substantially different background . </P> <P> The five Central Asian countries are highly agrarian, with 60% of the population living in rural areas and agriculture accounting for over 45% of total number of employed and nearly 25% of GDP on average . Kazakhstan, with its strong energy sector, is less agrarian than the average Central Asian country, with agriculture accounting for only 8% of GDP (but still 33% of total employment). It is closer in this respect to the core CIS countries of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus, where agriculture contributes around 10% of GDP and agricultural employment averages 15% . </P> <P> Agricultural land in Central Asia is mostly desert and mountain pastures . Arable land suitable for crop production is around 20% of total agricultural land (and as low as 4% in Turkmenistan). In Russia and Ukraine, on the other hand, arable land is 60% - 80% of agricultural land . As a result, pasture - based livestock production is more prominent in Central Asia than in the core ClS countries . </P> <P> By far the two most significant crops in Central Asia are rice and wheat . Only Kazakhstan does not cultivate significant amounts of cotton . Central Asia is largely desert, and cotton production strongly relies on irrigation . More than 80% of arable land in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan is irrigated, and only Kazakhstan, with its wheat - based crop production, irrigates only 7% of its arable land . The emphasis on intensive cotton cultivation in the Amudarya and Syrdarya basin countries has played a major role in the drying and polluting of the Aral Sea because of the large amounts of water and fertilizer used in cotton cultivation . Cotton mono - culture during the Soviet period exhausted the soil and led to serious plant diseases, which adversely affect cotton yields to this date . </P>

What is the most common food produced in monsoon asia