Below-target production of pulses to decline further

The below target production of pulses in the country this year would further decline next financial year due to excessive frost and consequently commodity prices would significantly increase, agriculture experts told Business Recorder.
"Cold weather has badly affected the crops of Gram, Mash and Moong in the country due to which we expect that the average production of pulses would decline to a great extent" said Dr Zahid Ashraf incharge pulses programme at National Agriculture Research Council (NARC).
He said that decrease in production of pulses would not only increase prices in the country but also raise import of the commodity next year. "If our researchers develop frost resistant verities of pulses the current situation would not exist. Total average production of pulses in Pakistan is 620 thousand tons for the last many years", he said.
Zahid said that the per hectare production and area dedicated to pulses production is decreasing with each passing year, saying that in the last few years per hectare production of gram at 580 kg and total area under cultivation of 1067 hectare is steadily declining.
Similarly, from 1992-93 the total area of production of Mash was 77,000 hectares while currently it is 30,000 hectares and its production has declined from 30 thousand tons to 15 thousands tons. Earlier Mosoor was grown over 63,000 hectares while currently sowing area is 31.6 hectares and its production declined from 28 thousands tons to 15.8 thousands tons.
Agri Forum Pakistan Chairman Ibrahim Mughal said that due to poor planning and research, production of pulses is decreasing with each passing year in the country. He said that pulses have registered a drop of over 24 per cent as pulses production witnessed a decline from 0.83 million tons to 0.635 million tons. The government had placed non technical people as head of research organisations. "Government needs to chalk out effective strategy to improve annual yield of all locally grown pulses and decrease dependence on imported pulses," sources maintained.
Pulses are cultivated on 5% of the total cropped area. Major pulse crops grown in the country are gram, mash, masoor and moong. Total area under major pulse crops in Pakistan is about 1.5m hectares. Among these pulses, chickpea is the major winter food legume and moong is the major summer legume. Chickpea occupies 73% of the total pulses area with 76% contribution to the total production, whereas moong bean occupies 18% of total area devoted to pulses contributing 16% to the total pulses production. The black gram and lentil, each are cultivated on 5% of the total pulses area and each of them contributes 5% to the total pulses production.