MULTAN, March 28: Federal Agriculture Minister Sikander Hayat Bosan has said mango export of the country can be increased considerably after following the WTO guidelines for the marketing of agricultural products. The minister said mango was an important horticultural crop of the country, which could earn substantial foreign exchange provided all the stakeholders envisaged a comprehensive marketing strategy to meet standards of the international markets.

He was speaking at the inaugural session of a four-day workshop on mango titled “Research, development and extension” here on Tuesday. The workshop is being organised jointly by the Pakistan Agriculture Research Council and Australia-Pakistan Agriculture Sector Linkage Programme.

The minister said Multan was the centre of mango production in country and the mouthwatering ‘Chaunsa’ variety had been its identity. He said mango crop was one of the main sources of income for the people in this part of the country.

He hoped that the workshop would succeed in finding out causes and remedies of the economically-dreadful disease ‘sudden death’ of the mango trees.