KARACHI: Climate change has affected mango crop in Pakistan, particularly in Sindh and Punjab, by 20pc.
The country may get late arrival of crop in both the provinces with less production.
Estimated 20pc mango crop has been affected by gusty winds, including recent dust-storm and rains. Further losses may occur if such weather situation continued.
“Pakistan is assessed to be one of the vulnerable countries to climate change. This vulnerability is mainly due to its geographic location, demographic and diverse climatic conditions. To reduce losses, Technology Needs Assessment (TNA) is one of the important steps towards identifying and assessing climate change adaptation challenges for Pakistan in order to align its adaptation needs and opportunities with goals and objectives of its sustainable development,” according to Economic Survey of Pakistan.
A growers’ community leader and agriculture expert Noor Muhammad told PPI that estimated 20pc mango crop had been affected across Sindh as unripe mango fruit had fallen due to gusty winds and recent dust-storm & rains, while Punjab has also faced same extend of mango crop losses due to such weather situation.
He suggested that the government should facilitate growers in use of new technologies to save mango crops.
“Mango crop in south Punjab is likely to arrive late in market due to weather changes. In this season, mango's maturity crop will be less due to ongoing rains and more gusty winds that may affect the exports of Chaunsa variety of mango, FPCCI Standing Committee on Horticulture Exports' former chairman Ahmad Jawadhe said.
On some positive side of the crop, he said despite mango orchards cutting for residential purpose in suburban areas of various cities of south Punjab, the cultivation area of mangoes was on the rise continuously.
In past, mango growers were not taking too much interest in improving mango cultivation area because they were not highly paid. Now they are ambitious to enhance cultivation area as they are earning handsome amount by exporting this fruit.
The mango orchards were located at an area of 117,000 hectares in the province during year 2011-12 while the cultivation area increased to 180,000 hectares in 2015-16.
“The mango crop is turning into industry and offering handsome returns to growers. To a query about enhanced area of mango, the MRS in-charge informed that different programmes, including Australia Pakistan Agriculture Sector Linkages Program (ASLP), USAID, and Punjab Agriculture Department provided much needed facilitation for quality fruit, imparted training to growers how to manage orchards and follow export standards. The income of growers has increased manifolds and this is basic reason behind increase in cultivation area,” he added.
Jawad further said that millions of mango plants were being planted annually in south Punjab. He said that there were over 35 mango nurseries in the city, adding that almost every nursery sod more than 50,000 plants during season.
The mango is the national fruit of Pakistan. The main mango growing districts in the Punjab province are Multan, Bahawalpur, Muzzaffargarh and Rahimyar Khan.
In Sindh, it is mainly grown in Mirpur Khas, Hyderabad and Thatta, In Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, it is grown in DI Khan, Peshawar and Mardan. Subsequently, a new trend of growing late varieties in Punjab has received a wide popularity which has extended the market period and added to the exportable surplus.
In Pakistan, 250 varieties of mango are found while most important commercial cultivars of Pakistan are Dasehri, Anwar Ratul, Langra, Chaunsa, Sindhri, Maldha, and Fajri.
In Pakistan, total area under mango cultivation is 170 million hectares with the production of 175 million tonnes being the second major fruit crop of Pakistan. The country produces 8% of world’s mango and mainly exports to Middle East, Germany, Japan, Italy and UK making its valuable contribution as an important foreign currency earning fruit crop.
Pakistani mango is recognized as one of the best of its kind in the world market. Pakistan is now the 4th largest producer in the world behind India, China, and Thailand.
It has been observed that in the past few years the production of quality Mangoes is on the decrease.
Pakistan’s horticulture has been badly hit by global warming and extreme weather patterns.
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