When Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar a year ago, it swept away Aung Kyaing's home, livestock and a bumper rice crop.

Now, like many families who survived the May 2-3 cyclone that left 140,000 people dead or missing and 2.4 million destitute, Aung Kyaing is crippled by debt after losing last year's crop as collateral.

To pay off his $650 debt - a huge sum in a country where many people earn less than $2 a day - the 43-year-old farmer says he will have to sell his entire crop this year.

Compounding his problems are estimates that rice yields in the area will be down a third this year due to soil salinity and heavy rains which disrupted the harvest.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has forecast a summer crop of 5.6 million tonnes, roughly the same as 2008.

But prices for rice and other commodities have also plunged along with the global economy.

"There won't be any left for ourselves," a despondent Aung Kyaing said, predicting that the family will have to borrow money again just so they can feed themselves.

Add to that the rising cost of inputs like fertiliser and many farmers say growing rice is no longer commercially viable.

Aid workers report similar stories from across the cyclone zone - families burdened by rising debt levels and smaller crops due to soil salinity, lost livestock, a lack of credit and outbreaks of pests damaging paddy fields.

Some 175,000 households in Bogale and Mawlamyaingkyun - two hard-hit areas in the delta - suffered crop losses due to brown hoppers, while farmers in Labutta and Kungyangone battled rats.

CYCLE OF DEBT

A study conducted by the World Food Programme (WFP), the U.N. food agency, in February found that 80 percent of those surveyed across Myanmar were in serious debt.

Seeking to break the debt cycle, the U.N. development agency has run micro finance and revolving loan programmes in the cyclone region, but admits much more is needed.

Currently there are 50,000 active borrowers in the micro finance programme, and 20,000 more will be added soon, while 15,000 households benefit from the revolving loan.

"Still, it is less than 100,000 and a drop in the ocean," said Sanaka Samarasinha, deputy resident representative.

A lack of formal credit has always haunted farmers in Myanmar, but Nargis forced people to turn to private lenders demanding interest rates ranging from 8 to 20 percent.

"We're in a cycle of debt. All we're doing is shifting it from monsoon harvest to summer and summer to monsoon. I don't think we will ever get out of this hole," said Win Than, a Labutta farmer who lost four buffaloes during the hot summer.

One aid worker recounted the story of a farmer who was forced off her land for a $700 debt and may have to sell her home to buy back enough land to survive.

The landless, who make up 25 percent of the rural population, rely on wages from working in the paddy fields. If the harvest is small, they will struggle to buy food.

"In many parts of the delta, food is available in the market. It's just that people can't afford it," said WFP country director.

Some farm labourers are worried.

One female worker, her face covered in a yellow-white paste that protects her from the blazing sun, said that before the cyclone she earned enough working in the fields and weaving palm leaves.

But the cyclone, which destroyed most of the trees around her village, has often left her with no work.

"For the next one and a half months, we have no income," she said. "We will have to borrow money to make ends meet."