LAHORE, April 8: Pakistan Agricultural Storage & Services Corporation (Passco) will procure 1.4 million tons of wheat from Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan this year.

"There is no upper limit for procurement in terms of quantity, we have arranged enough financial resources to carry out procurement operations," Managing Director Passco, Maj Gen Fahim Akhtar Khan told a news conference here on Thursday. General Manager (Field) Passco Brig Pervaiz Akbar was also present on the occasion.

Of the targeted quantity, the corporation would procure 1.22 million tons from 15 districts of the Punjab where procurement would commence on April 10 (Saturday), while it had already kicked off in Sindh from March 31.

Mr Fahim said that the districts identified for procurement of 0.15 million tons wheat in Sindh were Sukkur, Khairpur, Ghotki, Nawabshah and Nowshero Feroze. He said that 30,000 tons would be procured from two districts of Balochistan i.e. Jaffarabad and Nasirabad.

He observed that State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) had provided a credit line of Rs22 billion at the very reasonable mark-up rate of 1.74 per cent. Talking about previous year's experience of wheat procurement, he said the corporation could not achieve the target last year due to late beginning of the process.

"We were able to procure 0.785 million tons wheat last year against a target of 1.2 million tons," he said. The Passco chief said that active participation of the private sector was likely to keep wheat prices more stable this time.

Responding to a question, he said that Passco had communicated its apprehensions about the possibility of price increase beyond the support price. He said 60 per cent of the wheat procured by Passco was stored at open places while 40 per cent went to the formal storage facilities.

Due to effective storage arrangements, Mr Fahim said that no losses had been reported from any part of the country. Answering a query about the status of the silos construction project on public-private partnership basis, he said the government had abandoned the project due to its non-viability in financial terms.

"The terms and conditions offered by private sector for the construction and operation of the silos were not realistic," he observed. The private sector had suggested a storage cost of Rs1,075 per ton against Rs50 per ton presently being spent by Passco for the purpose, he added.

He said Passco and provincial food departments of Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan and NWFP presently had a storage infrastructure, including silos and traditional godowns, with a total capacity of 4.3 million tons. -APP