The federal government has decided in principles to carry out estimation of crops production area, particularly cotton crop, through satellite.
The decision has been taken at a meeting held at the Ministry of Commerce when it was found that the estimates of crops specially that of cotton is not reliable and more often than not its authenticity has been challenged by experts and even growers.
The Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (Suparco) was assigned the task to explore the possibility of monitoring crops and production area and prepared a PC-I.
A spokesman of the Sindh Agriculture Department told Business Recorder that a meeting held under chairmanship of Minfal additional director Dr Hanif and attended by experts of Sindh and Punjab province was briefed by the director remote sensing of Suparco on the importance of the project.
He said that satellite monitoring would provide accurate information of land utilisation, barrages, canals, distributaries and all other related areas of agriculture.
He said this system is already in operation in various developed countries including the United States and proved beneficial.
He said that the PC-I has already been submitted to the Minfal, and once approved, the system would be introduced without further delay.
The spokesman further said that only the financial matter with provincial share is remained to be decided. The Minfal would administer the project.