Grain farming was established in the steppe land of northern Kazakhstan in the Virgin Lands programme of the 1950s and 1960s. However, and similar to the situation in neighbouring Siberia, variable climate led to volatile harvests and the soils in some of the new lands were unsuited to long-term cultivation - about 30%, according to the World Bank (1992). Other regionally important crops include sunflower seeds and oil crops in the northeast and rice in Kyzylorda.