Wheat output targets delayed till finalisation of price

Islamabad: The Federal Committee on Agriculture (FCA) was unable to establish production targets for Rabi crops during a recent meeting, due to the pending announcement of an illustrative price for wheat. The meeting, chaired by National Food Security Minister Rana Tanveer Hussain, aimed to finalize targets after the price announcement.

The Prime Minister has tasked an eight-member committee to propose policy actions for the wheat sowing season to ensure adequate production. The committee, led by the Prime Minister's adviser on inter-provincial coordination and comprising key officials, discussed challenges such as rising input, energy, and transportation costs.

The government is addressing these issues by ensuring affordable inputs and remunerative prices, including an appropriate wheat illustrative price. Water availability for Rabi crops is expected to be 22% lower in Punjab and Sindh, while provinces are allocated 29.18 MAF of water. Soil moisture stress is anticipated in October and November due to below-normal rains in the past three months, but improvement is expected with above-normal rains forecast for the next two months.

Seed availability for the Rabi season is reported to be satisfactory. The committee reviewed Kharif crop performance, noting increases in sugarcane, rice, maize, mungbean, and chillies production. Sugarcane production for 2025-26 is estimated at 97.2 million tonnes from 1.358 million hectares, with an 18.5% and 21.1% increase in area and production, respectively, over FCA targets.

Rice production is estimated at 10.182 million tonnes from 3.902 million hectares, showing a 28.4% increase in area. Maize production is forecast at 9.97 million tonnes from 1.83 million hectares, with a 21% rise in area and 3.2% in production. Mungbean production is estimated at 171,000 tonnes from over 225,000 hectares, a 32.3% increase in area and 14.8% in production.

Chillies also saw growth in area, production, and yield compared to the previous year. Total availability of urea for 2026-27 is estimated at 3.95 million tonnes, with 765,000 tonnes of carryover stock and 3.18 million tonnes domestic production. Urea offtake is expected at 3.5 million tonnes, with the gap between supply and demand filled through imports by the private sector.

The State Bank allocated an indicative agricultural credit disbursement target of Rs3,062 billion for the 2026-27 fiscal year, a 19% increase from the previous year's disbursement of Rs2,573 billion.