MULTAN, June 1: The area under cotton cultivation in the Punjab this year is 16 per cent less than the corresponding period last year.

This was stated by Punjab Minister for Agriculture Khursheed Zaman Qureshi while speaking at a press conference here on Saturday.

Earlier, the minister presided over a fortnightly meeting of the Cotton Crop Management Group at the Central Cotton Research Institute.

Khursheed Zaman said cotton had been sown on an area of 2.275 million acres in the Punjab by the end of May this year against 2.7m acres during the same period last year. This reflected that only 37 per cent of the Punjab’s cotton sowing target of six million acres for the year 2002 could be achieved so far.

He was, however, optimistic that cotton sowing would gain momentum in the days to come because of improvement on water front after the recent rains in the province. Besides, the glaciers have also started melting down.

“We have two more weeks (to improve the situation). The prime sowing period ends on June 15,” he said.

He said apart from water shortage, breaches in the canal headworks system in Dera Ghazi Khan and Rajanpur districts and prices depression at the end of 2001-2002 season were other factors which resulted in the slow sowing of cotton.

The recent windstorm and rain was a blessing for the cotton plants. “The storm uprooted the cotton plants which were drying down owing to severe hot weather and caused resowing of the crop. It had saved the growers from further destruction after the lowering down of the temperature.”

He said the government was assessing the damage caused by the storm to mango crop in south Punjab to compensate or extend assistance to the growers.

The government would ensure that the farmers would get quality pesticides on time during the cotton season. “Rogues and cowboys in the pesticides business will be dealt with an iron hand,” he said.

He said in order to meet the textile industry’s demand of long and extra-long staple cotton, the government had now started focusing on research to produce hybrid cotton in the country.

He appreciated the services of a grower, Saddiq Akbar Bokhari, in the field of hybrid cotton. He said the hybrid cotton’s production on large-scale could only be achieved through the official patronage.

He said the commercial variety of CIM-473 would be second to none of the cotton world viz-a-viz its rich characteristics of being virus-resistant, heat tolerant, staple quality and per acre yield.

Admitting that marketing of cotton was a serious problem, he said the issue would be duly addressed in the official cotton policy for the year 2002-2003.

The government was encouraging growers this year to opt for cooperative ginning of cotton through credit facility and educating them about the benefits of the venture.