The Barley is crucial for the production of animal feed, as it is important technical crop and in some countries – it is used for food industries. It is cultivated in the parts of the world with moderate climate, mostly in Europe. Nearly 800 million acres are been dibbled yearly with barley and almost half of them just in Russia and China. The grains and the hay are used for animal nutrition and some countries significant part of the grain is used for the production of malt, beer and other products.


In Bulgaria the cultivated area with this crop used to reached around 4.8 million of tones (1980) but because of some negative climate changes and the decrease of the farm animals in the beginning of the 20th century this area has decreased more two times and in 2013 only 1.8 million acres are taken with barley and the harvest is 700 000 tones from which only 300 000 tones are exported. On the matter of productivity the barley has equal yield to the wheat and in some years the barley even gives better yield. In average the these number reach 350-450 kg per acre and it good weather conditions from vast areas it can be harvest 600-700 kg per acre.

Depending on the purpose of its, the barley is divided in two types – for animal feed and malting barley. In Europe for the production of malt is been used only spring barley. In Bulgaria though, because it is been dibbled only in the autumn, the quantities with protein level higher than 12.5 and hectoliter over 67 are been defined as malting barley and rest – as for animal feed.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Wheat Maize Sunflower Rape Barley