Wheat production to grow by 3.24 percent this year

The wheat crop production during the current fiscal year of 2011-12 is targeted to increase by 3.24 percent over the production of last fiscal year (2010-11). As much as 25 million tons of wheat would be produced during the current fiscal year against the actual production of 24,214 million tons during last year, an official document revealed.
Although the government had set target of 25 million wheat production during 2010-11 but achieved 24.214 million due to devastating floods, showing negative growth of 3.1 percent against the fixed target. Despite unfavourable circumstances, wheat production during 2010-11 witnessed increase of 3.9 percent when compared to the production of 23.310 million tons in 2009-10, the document added.
In addition area for production of wheat for year 2010-11 had been set at 9,045 thousand hectares but the crop was cultivated on 8,804 thousand hectares. Wheat is the leading food grain of the country and being staple diet of the people, it occupies a central position in formulation of agriculture policies, the document said adding wheat contributes 14.4 percent to the value added in agriculture and 3.1 percent to GDP.
On the other hand, the production of rice crop is targeted to grow by 37.11 percent to 6.613 million tons during the current fiscal year against the achieved target of 4.823 million tons in 2010-11. The rice production target for the year 2010-11 was fixed at 6.176 million tons but due to unfavorable circumstances and devastating floods, production was reduced to 4.823 target, showing down fall of over 28 percent.
The production of maize is expected to grow by 9.4 percent from the production of 3.341 million tons in 2010-11 to 3.656 million tons in 2011-12. The production of sugar cane is targeted at 57.580 million tons against the achieved target of 55.309 million tons last year, showing an increase of 4.1 percent.
The production of cotton would grow from 11.6 million bales last year to 12.8 million bales this year, an increase of 10.34 percent, according to the Annual Plan 2011-12. Similarly, the production of gram would increase from 0.523 million tons last year to 0.676 million tons this year, showing an increase of 29.2 percent. However, production of potato and onions is likely go down 10 percent and one percent respectively over the production of last year. Potato production is likely to decrease from 3.726 million tons to 3.328 million tons while the production of onion is expected to decline from 1.891 million tons to 1.872 million tons.