Story of missed agriculture targets being repeated.

Byline: Ahmad Fraz Khan

The agriculture cycle seems to be in trouble yet again, despite the earlier optimism. After hitting a paltry growth rate of 0.85 per cent last year, better planning and execution was expected to deliver a higher growth rate.

However, things are threatening to get worse instead of better - mainly because of climatic impact but with other factors, such as rising cost of production, poor technology and lack of awareness on emerging sectoral issues, contributing as well.

Six weeks of erratic weather - from the second half of August to the end of September - badly affected the agriculture sector. Unusually high temperatures (hovering in the mid-40s degree Celsius) and accompanying strong winds damaged the rice and maize crops at the grain formation stage. Sugar cane and cotton were also adversely impacted. Together these four crops dragged down the performance of the sector, the extent of which will be detailed in the next economic survey.

Cotton crop alone is expected to cost the national exchequer over $2 billion in imports and bring the national agricultural economy down by a whopping Rs300bn

Right now, both farmers and agriculture officials are calculating the loss and differing widely on its extent. The farmers think they have lost well over 20pc of the rice production in Punjab. The Punjab Agriculture Department, however, thinks otherwise. It concedes that the sector was impacted by weather changes but insists that the production target of four million tonnes was surpassed as rice was sown on 5m acres against a target of 4.7m acres, thus compensating for the loss.

The farmer and traders do not agree with this assessment. Shahzad Malik, a major trader and exporter estimates the loss at 15-20pc this season and cites field reports to substantiate his claim.

The case of maize, an autumn crop sown in late July and harvested in October, is similar. Official figures put production at 6m tonnes against a target of 5.3m, whereas farmers from central Punjab estimate a 15pc yield loss as high temperatures adversely impacted grain formation and weight at the pollination stage. They think official figures are inflated by at least 25pc.

With grain loss, the farmers have also lost purchases from the silage industry since it does not help produce milk in livestock.

Both farmers and officials agree that cotton and cane suffered massive losses which could dent overall sectoral growth rate. The most crucial loss stems from cotton for...