ISLAMABAD: Parliamentary Secretary for National Food Security Ameer Sultan Friday informed the National Assembly that the government had launched programs to enhance the local production of oil seeds.
Responding to questions during “Question Hour” he said currently 2.75 billion dollars were being spent on the import of oil seeds. He said the execution of these programs would help the country to cut this import bill by 600 million dollars by 2024.
He said that the Ministry of National Food Security & Research had launched National Oilseed Enhancement Programme” with a total cost of Rs 10.964 billion for five years under the National Agriculture Emergency Programme (2019-2024) to boost the adoption of oilseed crops.
“Promotion of Olive Cultivation on Commercial Scale in Pakistan” with a total cost of Rs 6410.229 million for a period of 3 years (2021-2024) had also been introduced, he added.
Under this project, he said, the olive plantation would be undertaken on 75, 000 acres. The project will also establish olive nursery infrastructure, olive oil extraction unit, and oil testing facility. Besides this drip irrigation on 5000 acres in barani areas will be established.
He said several endeavours were being made under the PSDP Pulses project to achieve self-sufficiency in lentils.
At present, he said, lentil is cultivated on 3000 hectares in Tank. Seed of high quality has been supplied in the area so that better yield and production may be fetched.
He said some areas in Balochistan had also been identified as provincial hubs for lentil production.
He said that during 2020-21, the estimated annual gross milk and red meat production of Pakistan was 63.7 million tons and 3.145 million tons respectively.
He said that according to estimates based on inter-census data, the current production of milk and red meat was not decreasing in Pakistan.
During 2020-21, he said, the annual increase in the gross milk and meat production was 3.2% and 3.1% respectively as compared to last year.