ISLAMABAD, Dec 10: The wheat sowing in the country has recorded an increase of 3.7 per cent compared to the corresponding period of last year and the target for sowing 60 per cent of the crop by the end of November has been met.

Official sources told Dawn here on Friday that wheat sowing had been completed on 5.397 million hectares in the four provinces. The Federal Agriculture Committee (FAC) had given a sowing target of 8.29 million acres to the provinces and had asked them to complete sowing on 60 per cent of the target area by the end of November.

The FAC had given a target of 6.2 million hectares to Punjab, 880,000 hectares to Sindh, 770,000 hectares to the NWFP and 340,000 hectares to Balochistan. The area on which wheat was sown by end-November was 65.1 per cent of the target set by the FAC.

The officials said the government was not expecting this increased level of sowing because of a delay in the sugarcane crushing season by sugar mills in Punjab and Sindh.

The millers and their association, they said, had already delayed the sowing of wheat in both the provinces by more than one month as they started crushing after Eid. That was why farmers were not able to cut sugarcane and clear the land for wheat sowing on time.

Officials said that wheat sown in October and November was more productive than that cultivated afterwards. Lack of rains and shortage of irrigation water in most areas was posing a problem for wheat sowing.

A persistent dry spell had already affected the agriculture sector last year, with rain-fed areas being the worst hit. Wheat production in Barani areas was again expected to be lower, the officials said.

Farmers in most parts of the NWFP and Balochistan could not afford the high price of DAP fertilizer. The DAP rates per bag had crossed the Rs1,000 mark. In the NWFP, its price had touched Rs1100, putting extra burden on farmers.

In many areas, farmers had sown wheat without DAP, while in other areas they had taken recourse to using cheaper, substandard variety of DAP. The target area given to Punjab for wheat sowing was 22 per cent more than the previous year, and constituted about 81 per cent of the total target given by the FAC.

In Sindh, wheat sowing had to be completed on 880,000 hectares this season, which was 21.1 per cent higher than last year. The sown area was 42.4 per cent of the total target set by the government.

In NWFP, the crop had to be sown on 770,000 hectares while Balochistan was to cover 340,000 hectares. The crop size was expected to be 20.2 million tonnes this season, the official said.

According to an agriculture expert, the wheat sowing exercise was facing problems due to lack of rains and shortage of irrigation water. The situation would improve if the country received normal rainfall during the course of wheat sowing. Better management and application of new techniques were helping growers to attain their targets despite the dry spell, he said.