The central government will set aside 10.5 billion yuan (1.31 billion U.S. dollars) for development of agriculture this year, said Liao Xiaojun, Vice-Minister of Finance.

Liao made the remarks at a work meeting on national spring agriculture held at Bengbu, East China's Anhui Province, on Tuesday.

The figure is about 800 million yuan (100 million U.S. dollars) more than that in the previous year, Liao said.

The investment will mainly be spent on irrigation work for small-sized farms, improvement of low-yield farmlands and technology to produce high quality grains.