The PSDP-2006-07 for agriculture is expected to touch around Rs 11.8 billion mark, which is 30 percent more than the last year, said Minister for Food and Agriculture, Sikandar Hayat Bosan on Wednesday.
Presiding over a meeting held here to firm up budgetary proposals for agriculture sector, the minister said a number of developmental initiatives were being started, including a special programme for productivity enhancement of small farmers covering 13,000 villages by the year 2015.
This would help reduce yield gap over 50 percent between progressive growers and small farmers and result in higher production of agriculture.
He also mentioned Agriculture Business Development Project, which is aimed to develop 705 agri business enterprises through formulation of 1250 farmers groups involving 12,500 farmers. The project will increase capacity in horticulture and livestock business.
He further said the livestock sector was being focused to harvest available potential and reduce poverty. Two major projects of Rs 3 billion for livestock farming were introduced to enhance community driven milk and dairy production and increase red meat production.
For commercialisation of livestock sector, he said companies namely Livestock and Dairy Development Board and Pakistan Dairy Development Company had been established. These efforts would result in 10,000 dairy farms.
He said to strengthen the research system, Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) would be provided additional funds of Rs2.8 billion and Central Cotton Research institute, Multan would be upgraded to the level of an International Center of Excellence in cotton research.
During the meeting, an elaborate discussion was held about various options for suggesting appropriate budgetary proposals to get necessary support for the farm sector.
It was emphasised by all the farmers' representatives that necessary steps should be taken to reduce farm input cost, which was drastically risen in last few months. This includes price increase of fertiliser, pesticides and energy.
The participants of the meeting also showed confidence in the vision of Federal Minister for Food, Agriculture and Livestock for presenting their case at the appropriate levels.
The meeting was attended by Minister of State for Food and Agriculture, Muhammad Ali Malkani, Minister of State for Interior, Zafar Iqbal Warraich, Malik Allahyar Khan, Chairman Public Accounts Committee and Dr Rozina Tufail, MNA/Parliamentary Secretary.
The representatives from farming community and officials from the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock also attended the meeting.