PAKISTAN imports large quantities of pulses to fill the increasing gap between domestic production and demand. The country’s dependence on imported pulses consumed foreign exchange worth $139.096 million during the fiscal 2010-11 — a surge of 53 per cent over a year.

The price of imported pulses has gone up owing to depreciating value of local currency. The prices of imported pulses in the Jodia Bazar wholesale market have peaked during the recent days, reducing their demand by 15 to 20 per cent. The wholesalers and retailers attribute that to eroding purchasing power of consumers.

According to reports, 628.508 thousand tons of pulses were imported during 2010-11 as compared to 444.976 thousand tons during 2009-10, despite a large area, estimated at some seven per cent of the total cultivated acreage, under pulse crops.

Pulses are sown on an average five per cent of the country’s total cultivated land. The area under this crop in 2009-10 was around 1395.20 thousand hectares. The production has declined over the years.

Major pulse crops are gram, masoor, mung and mash. Gram (chickpea) and masoor (lentil) are the major Rabi (winter) crops while mung and mash are the important Kharif (summer) crops. Among them gram gets major importance and occupies 73 per cent of the total area covered by pulses with about 74 per cent contribution to the total pulse production; whereas mung bean occupies 13 per cent of the total area and contributes 16 per cent to the total pulse output. Mash and masoor, each cultivated on two per cent of the total pulses area, contribute 1.4 per cent to the total pulse crop, official reports indicate.

According to the data released by the Federal Bureau of Statistics, pulses’ imports surged by 98.92 per cent during July-December 2010-11 against the same period of 2009-10. Food imports alone in December 2010 had registered an increase of over 121 per cent against the same month of 2009. Economic experts believe the main reason of the huge food imports is disruption of the supply chain in farm sector’s post-floods situation.

Anees Majeed, Chairman Karachi Wholesalers and Grocers Association, said the increase in pulses price was owing to decline in the value of local currency versus dollar. He also attributed the sharp fall in local yield mainly to prolonged winter in pulse-growing areas mainly in Punjab and Sindh, which reduced the annual output to less than 50 per cent as compared to previous year.

Gram: Chickpea is mostly grown in the rain-fed areas of Punjab while in Sindh it is cultivated in canal-irrigated land. For this very reason in most cases on an average per acre yield of chickpea in Sindh is more than in Punjab. The production of gram in 2010-11 stood at 0.57 million tons against 0.74 million tons a year earlier, showing a decrease of 23 per cent due to reduction in area under cultivation and unfavourable climate.

Gram is a major pulse crop. During this season only 291 thousand metric tons of the commodity has been produced against 496 thousand tons in the same period last year. The domestic consumption of gram is about 0.60 million tons annually. Shortage of pulse escalated its price by 66 per cent from Rs71 per kg to Rs118 per kg this month.

According to statistical data, Punjab contributes over 81.6 per cent to the overall gram production, Sindh about 9.6 per cent, Balochistan 5.5 per cent, while share of Khyber Pukhtoonkhwa is 3.3 per cent.

Mung: According to statistics, production of mung has gradually fallen from 138,500 tons in 2006-7 to 118,000 tons in 2009-10. Punjab contributes about 86.7 per cent of the total production. The domestic demand is of 106 thousand tons while the local output of 118,000 tons.

Masur: According to official data, in 2008-09 about 14,400 tons of the pulse was produced and in 2009-10 the production fell to 11,700 tons. Punjab contributes 49.3 per cent to country’s masur production.

The domestic consumption of masur is over 50 thousand tons and the current local production is 11,700 tons, which reflects a shortfall of 38,000 tons to be fulfilled by imports.

Mash: This pulse is one of the important Kharif crops and is grown in all the four provinces with Punjab contributing 66.2 per cent of the production.

The domestic consumption of mash is about 45 thousand tons, while local production is 10,700 tons, the shortfall being met through imports.

Ibrahim Mughal, Chairman Agri-Forum of Pakistan, giving the reasons for falling pulse production, said the government had totally ignored the pulse growers compelling them to turn to alternative crops.

He said pulse growers did not get appropriate prices for their produce. No research work has been carried out by the government and due to non-availability of high-yielding seed varieties the production had dropped, he added.

“Cold weather has badly affected the pulse crops which would adversely affect the average yield, “ said Dr Zahid Ashraf, in-charge pulses programme at the National Agriculture Research Council (NARC). The decrease in production would not only increase prices but also raise import of the commodity next year, he added. Had the researchers developed frost-resistant varieties of pulses, the current situation could have been averted, he added.

Mr Mughal says that due to poor planning and lack of research, production of pulses was decreasing with each passing year. Pulses had registered a drop of over 24 per cent as the government had appointed non-technical people as the head of research bodies, he alleged.

“The government needs to chalk out effective strategy to improve annual yield of all locally grown pulses “ farmers maintain.

Anyatullah Khan, spokesman for the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, while accepting that pulses production had declined over the years, said there were sufficient stocks of pulses to meet local demand as the government has banned export of pulses.