LAHORE, Dec 21: Wheat has been sown on 13.725 million acres in the Punjab against the target of 14.826 million acres, achieving 92.57 per cent of the target.

The Federal Committee on Agriculture had fixed a target of 14.826 million acres and 15.63 million tons for yield for the current year.

According to an agriculture department official, wheat has been sown late this year because of late harvesting of cotton crop. Farmers harvested their crop late to get better yield as cotton fetched high price last season. Last year, the situation was opposite; farmers harvested cotton crop earlier because of poor price. Though the target has almost been achieved, farmers may continue sowing wheat as late an January. This is against the department’s advice which asked farmer to finish sowing by Dec 15, he said.

The department had asked the growers to use 50 kilograms of seed per acre if they finished sowing by Nov 15, 60 kg if sowing between Nov 16 and 30, and 70 kg from Dec 1 to 15, he said.

He said: “The department hopes that the target for the current season would be crossed easily by January.”

But, farmers disagree with the ‘departmental’ figures.

According to them, the department always painted a rosy picture though ground realities were totally different.

A wheat grower said the government has not assured them about availability of water for last watering. How farmers could risk sowing wheat in these circumstances, he said.

About the water shortage in the rest of the Rabi season, an irrigation official said crop would obviously be under stress for scarcity of water. But the department has chalked out a plan to control negative affects.

It had prepared a canal rotation plan in collaboration with the agriculture department to meet crop requirements. “Wheat needs first watering during the first 20 days of sowing, second after 80 to 85 days and third 120 to 125 days. The department is prepared for it,” he claimed.

“If there is some rain in January, the drought affects might be reduced correspondingly. But, the crop would be under pressure if there are no rains,” he said.

WHEAT STOCKS: According to the food department, it is currently holding 2.569 million tons in its stocks. It still has some 90,000 tons of leftover of the year 2000.