The United State Department of Agriculture (USDA) has predicted that Pakistan will miss its cotton production by about two million bales, as the mealy bug and cotton leaf curl virus (CLCV) has badly hit the crop.
The USDA latest report on world crops, issued on Friday, estimated that during the current fiscal Pakistan's production would stand at 12.3 million cotton bales as against the fixed target of 14.14 million bales set by the Ministry of Food Agriculture and Livestock (Minfal) for the 2008 fiscal year, predicting that the country would miss its production target by 1.8 million bales. Earlier, the USDA predicted that Pakistan would get some 14 million bales cotton production, which were also lower than the government's set target of 14.14 million bales.
However, the USDA in its November report cut the cotton crop estimates of Pakistan from 14 million bales to 12.48 million bales, which revealed that country would misses its target by nearest two million bales.
"Attack of mealy bug, cotton leaf curl virus, heavy monsoon rains and unavailability of pesticides are the chief reasons of shortfall in the cotton crop", said leading cotton trader Ghulam Rabbani.
The Minfal, for the first time in the history, has allowed sowing of insect-resistant bacillus thuringiensis (BT) cotton variety during the current season to get maximise cotton production to meet the domestic needs and for exports, he said
"However," he added, "the Minfal had made no arrangements to create awareness among growers about sowing and protection of BT cotton in the case of virus attack." On the other hand, despite the information of mealy bug attack, the Minfal did not make special arrangements for proper availability of pesticides. As a result, some 17-18 percent of cotton crop had been destroyed by the mealy bug, he said.
He said that while mealy bug attacked the standing cotton crop in August, the Minfal started import of pesticides in the September-October. "I m not satisfied with the USDA report and still expecting that the country's overall cotton crop would not be higher than the 11 million bales," Rabbani said.
He said that the country would be compelled to import short staple cotton to meet its local demand, besides long staple and extra long cotton, which was already being importing.
The Federal Crop Estimation Committee has already also estimated that the country's cotton production would be 12.8 million bales as against the target of 14.1 million bales, he said. He said that following the rising gap between supply and demand, the country would import some 2.5-3 million cotton bales during the current fiscal year.
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