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Wheat harvesting in Punjab to start in first week of April

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Deputy Agriculture Development Commissioner (DADC) of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MinFA), Imtiaz Ali told APP that due to timely rains and better weather conditions satisfactory wheat crop out look was reported with no complaints of insects attack or other diseases.

The harvesting will pick up momentum slowly in other wheat growing areas of the country because of moisture in the fields due to recent rainspell, he added.

A target of 25 million tons of wheat production was fixed for the year 2010-11, as the crop was cultivated over 8.8 million hectare of land in the country, he added.

As much as 1.3 million tons of wheat would be procured during the wheat procurement campaign for the year 2010-11 to fulfil the domestic requirements as well as for keeping the strategic reserves in the country," he added.

He said that the Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Services Corporation (PASSCO) has already finalized arrangements for by setting up about 200 centers in Punjab to procure wheat.

Copyright APP (Associated Press of Pakistan), 2011