MULTAN, May 21: Bad weather in Sindh and a disease known as ‘Powdery Mildew’ in Punjab has damaged the crop of mango, the king of fruits. Experts, who were predicting a bumper crop, now stress that this year crop would be better than last year but not as good as they had expected.

According to Khawaja Muhammad Shoaib of Farmers Vision Forum hailstorm has badly damaged the mango crop in Hyderabad, Tandu Adam, Tandu Allah Yar and adjoining areas of these districts in Sindh, while February rains has damaged the crop in Punjab.

He, however, said that the sudden start of heat wave after the rain had helped to control the damage but the crop would be late by about 15 days in Punjab.

He said that last year growers were able to fetch a good price which was highest ever it recorded. Their expectations are high this year too. He was critical of the exporters, who spend liberally elsewhere, but offer too low a price to the growers. “They pay Rs80-100 per kg air freight but are not ready to pay more than Rs20 per kg to the producers,” he added.

Mr Shoaib said the quality of mango can improve if picking and harvesting is supervised and the role of middleman is minimised. He suggested that the government should bind exporters to buy directly from the growers.

President Mango Growers Association Zahid Ali Gerdezi said that there was a need to improve the harvest technology with emphasis on cold chain system and establishment of export processing zone in mango farm areas.

He said that there was also a need to help the farmers in grading, cooling and storage of the fruit in there own areas.

Shamoon Sadiq, the chief executive officer Pakistan Horticulture development and Export Board told this correspondent that seven mango-exporting groups applied for the Euro-gape certificates that would make them eligible to export mango to Europe.

He confirmed that hailstorm and Powdery Mildew infection had slightly damaged the crop.

Pakistan is the sixth largest mango producing country of the world. Major markets for Pakistani mango are the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Amman, France, Afghanistan, Germany, Bahrain and the UK.