ISLAMABAD: Wheat harvesting season in the Punjab province is expected to formally start from April 15 and will continue for next two-month.
An official in the Ministry of Food Security and Research (MinFS&R) told APP here on Monday that due to prevailing hot climate across the wheat producing belt it was expected that the crop will mature for harvesting with in due date.
He further informed that the harvesting has been started in some areas of Sindh province adding that the process will get momentum in the rest of crop producing areas of the country as currently moisture was observed in fields of standing crop.
The official said that wheat crop was set a cultivatation target of over 22.7 million acre across the country to produce 25 million tons to fulfill the domestic consumptions as well as to export.
In Punjab, it was cultivated over 16 million acre as against the set target of 16.95 million acre to produce 19.2 million tons, in Sindh 2.5 million acre against the fixed targets of 2.7 million acre to get out-put of 3.2 million tons, he added.
In Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa wheat was cultivated over 0.6 million acre and 1.78 million acre respectively as against the set targets of 0.8 and 1.5 million acre respectively.
In Balochistan and KP the crop out put was fixed at 0.8 million and sown over 1.5 million tons for the period under review.
He said that the total wheat out-put across the glob is expected to remain 665-670 million tons as against it consumption of 680 million tons globally.
Meanwhile, he said that all the arrangements were also finalized to start the wheat procurement campaign for the year 2012-13 which will started by the end of current month.
In this regard, he said that Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Services Corporation (PASSCO) has established 220 centers in 11 zones across the country to start its wheat procurement campaign for the year 2012-13.
All the logistic arrangements have been finalized to procure about 2 million tons of wheat to fulfill the domestic requirements as well as keeping the strategic stocks and export, he added.
The corporation has divided the country in 11 zones and established 220 centers, adding that Punjab was divided into nine zones, while Sindh and Balochistan both are considered as single zone separately.
For the wheat procurement operation 2012-13, he said PASSCO has arranged 15 million jot bags for the growers to facilitating them to sell their out-put at official fixed cost of Rs.1050 per 40 kg.
He further said about eight bags per acre would be provided to the growers on showing the land revenue records to keep transparency during the campaign.
The PASSCO was striving to provide more bags for the growers having less then 10 acre land without further inquiry to sell their produces.
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