ISLAMABAD, Jun 25: The agriculture sector exhibited a growth of 3.1 per cent during the last ten months of current fiscal year mainly due to positive growth in agri-related sub-sectors, except minor crops.

Major crops accounted for 31.9 per cent of agricultural value added and experienced a growth of 3.2 per cent during the period with negative growth of 0.2 per cent last year.

The significant growth in major crops is contributed by rice, cotton and sugarcane by 27.7 per cent, 18.6 per cent and 4.9 per cent, respectively.

As per data of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, minor crops contributed 10.1 per cent value addition in agriculture and exhibited a negative growth of 1.3 per cent during the year against 2.7 per cent growth of 2011.

The livestock sector, which has 55.1 per cent share in the agriculture, grew by 4 per cent during this year while fishery sector grew by 1.8 per cent as against last year's growth of 1.9 per cent.

Forestry sector posted a positive growth of 1 per cent this year as compared to negative growth of 0.4 per cent last year.

Pakistan’s performance is dependent upon timely availability of irrigation water. During this year, the availability of water as a basic input for Kharif 2011 (for the crops such as rice, sugarcane and cotton) has been 10 per cent less than the normal supplies but 13 per cent higher than last year's Kharif 2010 season.

The water availability during Rabi season (for major crop such as wheat), is estimated at 29.4 MAF, which is 19.2 per cent less than the normal availability, but 15 per cent less than last year's Rabi crop.—APP