Pakistan earned $479mln through fruits and vegetable exports in last 8 months.

KARACHI -- Pakistan's forex earnings of fruits and vegetables during first eight months of current fiscal year i.e. between July 2018 and Feb 2019, totaled US$479 million. According to available statistics, this was about 24% higher than the corresponding period in 2017-2018 with exports of horticulture goods recorded to be $387mln.

A horticulturist by profession and former chairman of FPCCI Standing Committee Horticulture Exports, Ahmad Jawad talking to said the $92mln gain was a good amount which was gained after exporting much larger quantities of fruits and vegetables as compared to previous year. "Much more could have been earned without squeezing supplies in local markets through adequate and efficient application of updated technology to raise growth and improve quality of our products," he said. Emphasizing that there was dire need to invest in technologies that were must for enhancing outputs and improving quality of exports, the horticulturist said efforts and impetus were also required to reach out to new export markets.

To another query, Ahmad Jawad said the country's potential in terms of fruits and vegetables export was huge-by some estimates up to $5 billion a year. Supplementing his claim, he said between July-Feb FY19, Pakistan's exports of fruits and vegetables stood in excess of 1.165mln tones whereas in July-Feb FY18 it was 1.016mln tones. "Consequently supplies to local markets shrank by no less than 149,000 tones well manifested through significant raise in the prices of almost all locally grown fruits and a number of vegetables, minus potato," said Jawad also a senior export of horticulture goods. With regard to potato, he said the country had a glut of the crop this year. "The ground reality demands that investments are made to revamp and modernise our horticulture sector," he reiterated mentioning that during the entire last fiscal year, combined export earnings of fruits and vegetables rose to around $641.7mln from $565.8 million a year ago. "This was just...