The largest manufacturing industry in Pakistan, it contributes 8.5% to our GDP and employs about 45% of the country’s labour force and 38% of its manufacturing workers. The 4th largest producer of cotton with the third largest spinning capacity in Asia after China and India, Pakistan contributes 5% to the global spinning capacity.  Today 1,221…

Millions of people have lost their jobs and more will still lose, the pandemic not only taking lives but badly aggravating the economic crisis. As times goes on many industries and commercial entities will go down, some permanently, and it will be no easy thing to revive the economy, at least we must try. But…

While the proportions of this debilitating process is not yet clear, the Covid-19 pandemic is causing a massive melt-down of global economy. The growth rates of some important western economies will go into the negative, for this quarter the US economy has shrunk by 4.8%, the biggest downtown since the 2008 recession. Such a global…

In May 2019 four people in Muzaffargarh were arrested for hoarding sugar and thus contributing to an artificial crisis; in one go-down had stocked 40,000 sugar bags, another berserk had hoarded 70,000 wheat bags; may thousands must have done the same without getting caught. The punishment for those two, was not reported, obviously it was…

Food security is of central importance to national security. That it was not been realized is surprising given that the sieges of forts and were only successful by forming them into cities starvation Now it will have to remain central to our security imperatives. With a population of more than 200 million people more than…

Vegetables constitute an integral component of our cropping pattern but the increasing pressure on food and cash crops has limited the area under vegetables to about 3.1% of the total cropped area. Because they have a shorter maturity period vegetables fit well in most farming systems. Vegetables provide proteins, minerals and vitamins required for human…

Pakistan is climatically capable of growing fruits easily and in abundance. Evidence for the growth of fruit and vegetables in the subcontinent has been provided from ancient times, citriculture is known from the Indus valley for some 4000 years. The climatic diversity is such that it allows cultivation of nearly all types of fruit temperate,…

Grown mostly in the two provinces of Punjab and Sindh, the former Pakistan’s cash crop production accounts for 79% and the latter 20% of the nation’s cotton growing land. The fourth largest producer of cotton in the world, more importantly Pakistan has the third largest spinning capacity after China and India in Asia with thousands…

Produced from sugarcane sugar constitutes Pakistan’s second largest agro-based industry after textiles ranking fifth in the world in cane acreage and ninth in sugar production. An important cash crop in our country. Sugarcane is an important source of income for the farming community employing over 1.5 million people. This includes management, technology experts, skilled and unskilled…

Extreme flooding and drought in recent years has sparked repeated national emergencies in Pakistan, which depends on the Indus for 90% of its food production. In 2010 and 2013 heavy flooding destroyed the harvest and the homes of millions of people while displacing them for months. From February to April 2019, widespread flash flooding affected…