A CLOSE study of the agriculture sector reveals that it could not achieve even the low target of 2.6 per cent in FY2000-01. On the contrary, it recorded a negative growth of 2.5 per cent.

This situation occurred on account of the shortage of irrigation water that persisted both in the Kharif and the Rabi seasons. Along with the losses in major crops, the performance of fisheries also remained subdued due to the low water levels in rivers, lakes, reservoirs and dams.

In absolute terms, this loss on account of the decline in value-addition by agriculture stood at Rs4.2 billion during the year which limited the increase in value-addition in the GDP to Rs16.6 billion. Last year agriculture’s share in Rs 24.3 billion GDP increase was Rs9.8 billion.

Given the vulnerability to natural vagaries the crop sub-sector is gradually losing its share in agriculture. It has declined from 65.1 per cent in FY1991 to 57.3 per cent in FY2001. As against this, the share of livestock is continuously rising. It increased to 37.7 per cent in FY2001 from 29.8 per cent in FY1991 and its share in the GDP improved from 7.6 per cent to 9.3 per cent in the same period. Compared to last year, the area and production of major crops registered a record decline of 4.4 per cent during FY2001. Details may be seen in Table-I.

Despite the fall in overall area under major crops, a shift within the cropping pattern was also customized to handle the situation in FY2001. At some places, less water-intensive crops substituted water-intensive crops, although 187,000 hectares of land was intentionally dropped by rice and sugarcane growers, while 93,000 hectares of this was added to bajra and moong cultivation. The remaining area was utilized for fodder, part of minor crops, whose area grew by 1.1 per cent during FY2001.

Crop-wise position: Major crops posted a negative growth of 10.5 per cent in FY2001. Among major crops, the production of food grains (wheat, rice, bajra, jawar, maize and barley), decreased by 8.5 per cent while sugarcane, cotton and mustard declined by 5.9 per cent, 4.3 per cent and 8.1 per cent, respectively. Value-added by these four major crops (wheat, rice, sugarcane and cotton) which makes up 36 per cent of agriculture, dropped by 12.2 per cent in contrast to a sharp rise of 17.6 per cent last year. Individually, a sharp decline of 6.7 per cent was recorded in the yield of wheat, 2.7 per cent in cotton, 1.4 per cent in rice ,and 1.1 per cent in sugarcane.

Unlike major crops, minor crops having 17.0 per cent share in agriculture, and 4.2 per cent in the GDP posted a positive growth of 1.1 per cent during FY2001 against a decline of 9.1 per cent last year. But individually, they showed a mixed trend.

The production of oilseeds declined by 4.3 per cent, while that of pulses increased by 6.2 per cent. The other two important minor crops viz potato and onion registered declines of 9.2 per cent and 9.7 per cent, respectively.

Livestock: It made up around 37.7 per cent of the agriculture and 9.3 per cent of the GDP in FY2001, on the basis of doubling its growth rate to 4.8 per cent as compared to last year. Being the second largest contributor to agriculture after crops, its performance compensated to some extent the fall in agricultural production, with strong growth in poultry products (white meat and eggs), all other components of livestock, both in terms of population and products, showed a positive growth.

As livestock is less vulnerable to adverse weather conditions compared to crops this creates an alternate source of rural income and is also able to diversify the farmer’s risk portfolio. Despite the limited policy attention on livestock, this sub-sector has grown by an average growth rate of 6.4 per cent during the past 10 years and in doing so, clearly out-performed all other sub-sectors of agriculture.

Conclusion: The strong performance of minor crops and livestock indicates the robust growth potential, particularly for the export. Furthermore, being less land-intensive and comprising of a diversified basket of output, these two sub-sectors have attracted sufficient interest in terms of corporate farming. With the emergence of thriving specialized markets in the west and Japan for organically produced food, the interest may be further cultivated by developing organic farming methods in Pakistan.