Pakistan’s major crops are going bust

The government of Pakistan is lying to you. 

But what else is new? 

Last week, the National Accounts Committee (NAC) released the latest GDP data for Pakistan. Immediately there was attention on the fact that the NAC was indicating Pakistan had a GDP growth rate of 2.68%. This was a revision from the government’s previous GDP growth projections which had predicted GDP growth rate at around 3.6% for 2025. 

Missing the target was not surprising. Global financial institutions were sceptical. The IMF had actually reviewed its projections earlier, predicting growth to be around 2.6% while the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank predicted it slightly higher at 2.8% in 2025.

The problem is even these revised projections from the government of 2.68% are far from accurate. At best, they are naive and hopeful. At worst they are deliberately misleading. In the numbers the government has released, GDP growth in the first three quarters has been 1.37%, 1.53%, and 2.4% respectively. While this indicates an increase in the growth rate with every quarter, it is still well short of the government’s projections of 2.68%. In fact, the average growth for these first three quarters is less than 2%. It was pointed out almost immediately by a number of individuals that the government was relying on a significantly increased projection of GDP growth in the ongoing fourth quarter being 5.47%

The projection of a sudden tide changing final quarter raises questions. On top of this, there is really very little in the NAC’s report that explains why the government would be this hopeful. Perhaps nothing indicates the dire situation Pakistan’s economy is facing more than the state of the agricultural sector. Overall, the agriculture sector increased by a very meagre 0.56% in this year. 

This growth is not only partially based on projections, it is also only possible because Pakistan’s livestock sector saw a decent rise of 4.7% with fishing also increasing by 1.7%. What is concerning, however, is that major crops saw huge dips in production. Through a combination of senseless policies, water shortages, and increasing input costs, major crops have crashed out. The most prominent victim in this scenario was wheat, which saw a 8.9% decline in production, but other major crops were pretty far behind as well. The question is, how did such a dip go largely unnoticed, and why are we not producing as much of these crops?