ISLAMABAD:The government has so far procured over 3.429 million metric tons (MT) of wheat under its wheat procurement campaign-2023 to fulfil the domestic requirements of staple food and build strategic reserves of the commodity for maintaining demand and supply at a smooth level in the country.
The wheat procurement targets for the current crop season were fixed at 6.8 million metric tons at an official support price of Rs3,900 per 40 kg to ensure a proper rate of return to local farmers across the crop-producing areas in the country, Food Security Commissioner in the Ministry of National Food Security and Research Imtiaz Ali Gopang told reporter.
He said wheat output during the Rabi season 2022-23 had increased by 1.6 per cent as compared to the production of last year, adding that the total output was estimated at 26.81 million tons.
He said the wheat crop was sown over 9 million hectares to fulfill the local staple food requirements as well as for keeping the strategic reserves. Owing to the incentives introduced by the incumbent government to mitigate the adverse impact of catastrophic floods and torrential rains during the last moon soon season and to revive the local agriculture sector, the output of Rabi crops witnessed significant growth, Gopang added.
So far, over 50.43 percent of wheat procurement targets had been achieved as the campaign was in full swing all across the crop-producing areas in the country and the provincial governments have also set up procurement centers to facilitate the growers to sell their produces at official fixed rates on their nearest sales point, he added.
Meanwhile, he said the Punjab government has completed 62.86 percent of its assigned procurement targets as it procured over 2.200 million metric tons of wheat against the targets of 3.500 million metric tons.
The Sindh Province has so far completed 40.50 percent of it procurement targets as it procured about 576,000 metric tons of wheat as against the set targets of 1.400 million metric tons, he added.
The Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Services Corporation (PASSCO) has completed 34.86 percent of its procurement targets, whereas Balochistan has completed 35 percent of its procurement targets, he added..
The Food Security Commissioner further informed that PASSCO has procured about 627,529 metric tons of grains as compared the targets of 1.800 million metric tons for the current season, whereas Balochistan has procured 35,000 metric tons as against the targets of 35,000 metric tons.