Cultivation of next season's crop: government asked to provide necessary inputs to KP farmers

The government on Tuesday was urged to provide farmers of frontier region with necessary inputs for cultivation of next season's crop with a warning that they might go for Poppy cultivation in the aftermath of devastating floods.
This was stated by Professor Dr Khan Bhadar Marwat, Vice Chancellor, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Agriculture University, Peshawar while addressing International Planning Workshop on 'Watershed Management & Land Rehabilitation, NW Frontier Region.'
Dr Marwat said that farmers of the frontier region were left with no options following the devastating floods, therefore, the government should facilitate them for cultivation of crops otherwise, the farmers might opt for cultivation of poppy. "The world knows that there are ample natural resources in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and FATA, which could play vital role in attaining economic self-sufficiency by the country," he added.
Earlier, Bashir Ahmed from Department of Agronomy KPK Agriculture University, Peshawar highlighted reclamation and utilisation of the waste cultivable mountainous land of the region for medicinal herbs and species. He said that the raw material of most of the traditional medicines system is derived from wild sources. These sources of medicinal herbs are generally those plants, which are growing wild in waste cultivable land of mountain and in thin forests.
In Pakistan, national and multinational pharmaceutical companies import raw material of medicinal herbs of worth $50 million, whereas Pakistan exports herbs for only $10 million. It indicates a huge imbalance between export and import of medicinal herbs, he added.
He said these herbs are alternative to major crops, however, based on their importance in health care, precious natural resources and economic value in trade their production will improve the growth rate of agriculture sector. While speaking on 'efficient management of arid land', Riaz A. Khattak from Agriculture University KPK, Peshawar, stated that agriculture economy and sustainable development in a country mainly depends on the scientific use of land resources.
About 1.964 billion hector of world land is degraded to varying degree with respect to biological productivity because of human intervention including deforestation (30 percent), over grazing (35 percent) and agricultural practices (28 percent). Out of the total land area of 88.2 million hectare, 48.2 percent (42.7 million hector) is arid and semiarid with P/ETP ratio of 0.03 to 0.50 in Pakistan, he added.
He said the situation is further confounded by the uneven topography with sloping land, uneven distribution of rainfall both spatially and temporally, prolonged over grazing by cattle's of Afghan refugees, larger size of cultural unmanaged waste lands and lack of soil and water conversation technology.
He said the land could be utilised and converted into biologically productive land provided the major constraints of soil degradation are addressed by adapting low cost efficient and scientifically sound technology including soil and water conversation practices.