Cotton Crop Assessment Committee to met by in 2nd week of August

ISLAMABAD: Cotton Crop Assessment Committee (CCAC) would met here by the second week of current month (August) in order to take stock of the output of major cash crop of the county during current season.

Restructuring of the committee has also been completed after the devolution of CCAC from the Ministry of Commerce to Ministry of National Food Security and Research, said Cotton Commissioner in the Ministry of National Food Security and Research Dr Khalid Abdullah.

Talking to APP here on Wednesday, he said that formulation of new committee had been finalized and all the relevant stakeholders were taken on board in order to sensitize the issues and challenges being faced by the cotton growers across the crop sowing areas of the country.

He said that representation of all four provinces, federal government and allied departments working under the respective governments of had also be alined for streamlining the matters related to enhance the output of the crop by facilitating the farmers and field extension departments.

Meanwhile, giving the over view of crop during current season, the Commissioner said that the cotton crop was in good shape and stability in prices in the domestic markets had enhance the interest in the crop and encouraged the farmers to put more land under cotton cultivation.

Besides, he informed that the federal government has imposed import duty on cotton, which would also help in price stabilization in the local markets.

"The cotton had been cultivated over 2.69 million hectares of land to produce 14 million cotton bales fixed during the current sowing season to fulfill the domestic requirements as well as for exporting, adding that crop sowing had registered about 1 percent increase across the crop producing areas of the country as compared the cultivation of corresponding period of last season," he remarked.

The cotton sowing targets were fixed at 2.95 million hectares in order to produce over 14 million cotton bales during the crop season 2018-19 in order to fulfill the domestic requirements as well as for exporting.

He informed that the crop cultivation targets, which fixed for the current sowing season were achieved by over 91 percent as it went up by 1.0 percent as compared with the area under cotton crop cultivation during same period of last year.

He said that overall cotton sowing in the Province of Punjab registered about 11 percent growth as it had cultivated the crop over 2.29 million hectares of land as against the set targets of 2.31 million hectares for the period under review.

However, he informed that crop sowing in the Sindh Province was decreased by 40 percent and attributed the low sowing trend with dry weather during the crop sowing time as well as shortage of water for crop irrigation.

The province, he said could achieve the sowing targets by 66 percent and cultivated the crop over 0.41 million hectares as against the targets of 0.62 million hectares fixed for current sowing season.

Meanwhile, he said that Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces were assigned a task to cultivated the crop over 0.1 million hectares.

Dr Abdullah said that due to recent rains the water availability for crop irrigation would strengthened, which would help in further boosting the area under cotton growing as well as enhance the output.

Meanwhile, the exports of raw cotton from the country during l2 months of last financial year ended on June 30, 2018 had registered over 33.65 percent growth as compared the exports of the corresponding period of last year as about 35,347 metric tons of the above mentioned commodity wroth US$ 58.227 million exported, which stood at 25,462 metric tons valuing US$ 43.567 million of same period last year.

During the period under review, about 521,959 metric tons of cotton yarn worth US$ 1.371 billion was also exported as compared the 458,074 metric tons valuing US$ 1.243 billion of the same period last year, according the data of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics.

During the period from July-June, 2017-18, the exports of the cotton yarn grew by 10.30 percent as compared the corresponding period of last year, where as the exports of yarn other than the cotton yarn grew by 38.85 percent, it added.

About 11,690 metric tons of yarn other than cotton yarn worth US$ 33.411 million exported as against the 2,519 metric tons valuing US$ 24.063 million of same period of last year, it added.