LAHORE
The Punjab Agriculture Department has claimed that agriculture sector of Pakistan is progressing much better than that of the United States America (USA), where a huge budget is allocated annually.
This very claimed has surfaced at the time when authorities in Pakistan are under criticism for not showing significant progress in agriculture sector while there is also criticism that the concerned departments are reluctant in adaptation of new techniques in agriculture sector in view of climate change which is also posing threat to the country’s food security.
According to the Director General (Research) Abid Mehmood, Pakistan has made significant progress in its agriculture sector during last five decades which was become possible because of vast research.
Talking to Pakistan Today, Abid claimed that Punjab Agriculture Department has adopted modern techniques in agriculture sector which helped in enhancing the quality and quantity of different crops. “For years, Pakistani farmers were relying on a few crops including wheat, rice, sugarcane, and cotton but now they are sowing other profitable crops like maize and oil seeds”, he said and added that besides sowing other crops we have increased significant production.
Claiming a better agriculture system of the country, Abid said that the farmers in Pakistan are growing their wheat crop at a high temperature of 48 degree celsius whereas farmers in USA never can think for this.
Growing crop at high temperature is made possible only in Pakistan which shows our performance in agriculture sector is better than any other country, he said.
“There was a time when Pakistan had to import wheat from other countries as it was unable to meet its wheat demands because per acre yield was less than the requirements but now here per acre yield has been reached upto 50 maunds,” he said and named it the achievement of agriculture department’s researchers.
He further said in USA the wheat crop takes around 11 months while in Pakistan this crop prepares in five months.
In past few years, issues regarding cotton growers were reported but Agriculture Department claimed a significant increase in cotton crop yields.
Abid said that in Pakistan farmers are growing cotton at high temperature while in the rest of world no country can grow this crop at the temperature above than 35 degree Celsius. He said that Pakistani scientist have created high-temperature tolerant varieties which are just available in Pakistan and that’s why cotton production is increasing with each year. According to him Agriculture Department has created FH 142, FH Lalazar and others.
Pakistan is also famous for its export quality rice which requires suitable sowing conditions and huge amount of water. A few months back an international journal warned that producing rice a large scale may lead the water scarcity condition of Pakistan more worsen in coming years as rice crop requires a lot of water.
This journal named that Pakistan was exporting water in shape of rice. However, Abid claimed that now agriculture department has introduced Direct Sowing Technology (DST) for rice crop which will help them to sow this crop directly while in past this crop required an abundance of water while sowing. He further told that Pakistan is the first country which introduced a unique technique which will keep the rice crop to be sustained during the floods. He showed his hope that this technique would be proven as the best to mitigate the water crisis.
Talking about the sugarcane crop he said that at the time of independence there were just two sugar mills in Pakistan which have increased up to 80 mills.
Abid said Pakistan is the only country where farmers are getting more than one crop in a year whereas in USA they hardly get one crop in a year.
