These procurement figures were realised till Wednesday (June 23), in which Punjab procured 3.721 million tonnes against total target of four million tonnes, showing 93% procurement process completed.

 

For Sindh, the government set a procurement target of 1.5 million tonnes and till Wednesday (June 23), the province procured 1.486 million tonnes, showing 99% target achieved. For Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the target was 0.3 million tonnes for the current season and so far only 0.217 million tonnes have been procured, showing 73% of the total target. For Balochistan, the target was 100,000 tonnes, and so far 61,708 tonnes have been procured, showing 62% target achieved, the sources said.

 

As for Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Services Corporation Limited (Passco), the total wheat procurement target was 1.6 million tonnes and till June 23 it procured 1.124 million tonnes, reflecting 70% target achieved.

 

Official sources said that Passco is confronting a shortfall of PKR13 billion (US$0.15 billion) for completing 1.6 million tonnes wheat procurement target for the year 2010. The government expects 23.864 million tonnes wheat production for the year 2010 against the target of 25 million tonnes, showing 4.5% shortfall from the target. The estimate of 23.864 million tonnes wheat production was achieved from 9.041 million hectares sowing areas.

 

The provincial break up are; Punjab 18.240 million tonnes against the target of 19.205 million tonnes, Sindh 3.651 million tonnes against the target of 3.862 million tonnes, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 1.184 million tonnes against the target of 1.210 million tonnes and Balochistan 0.789 million tonnes against the target of 0.903 million tonnes. With the arrival of new wheat production of 23.86 million tonnes and carryover stock of four million tonnes, total availability of the commodity would be 27.86 million tonnes, the sources said.

 

Accumulatively, total wheat requirement 26.2 million tonnes against the total availability of 27.86 million tonnes. The net surplus of wheat in the country is 1.66 million tonnes, the sources said. In 2007-08, when the wheat support price was PKR425 (US$4.98) per 40 kg, farmers brought 8.55 million hectares areas under sowing and produced 20.99 million tonnes. After increase in wheat support price from PKR425 (US$4.98) per 40 kg to PKR950 (US$11.1) per 40 kg in 2008-09, farmers brought 9.05 million hectares under sowing and wheat production enhanced to 24.032 million tonnes.

 

The increase in wheat support price benefited only producers of the commodity and the cost of flour in open market shot up from PKR20 (US$0.23) per kg to PKR30-32 (US$0.35-0.38) per kg. General dry spell and load shedding for electric tube wells had a negative impact on irrigated wheat crop. However, good rains during the last week of January and the first fortnight of February 2010 had a positive impact on crop.

 

This year, wheat crop faced a major setback in Barani areas where soil moisture at sowing stage remained shabbily low. Wheat under un-irrigated condition is 2.603 million acres. This showed drastic reduction of 14% compared to last year's achievement of 3.026 million acres.

 

Officials in the Ministry of Food and Agriculture said the farmers took keen interest in wheat sowing especially in the irrigated areas due to better financial liquidity accrued from attractive cotton prices and reasonable returns from rice crop.