He said that could be judged by the government's agriculture policy, which envisaged food security, increased productivity and export of agriculture commodities by ensuring availability of agriculture input, water, quality seed, agriculture machinery and transfer of modern farm technology to growers. He said government besides transferring modern technology of cultivation was striving hard to bring improvement in the Livestock and Horticulture sectors.
He said the President's agriculture package estimated to cost rupees 66 billion to streamline 86,000 watercourses in the country was aimed towards sustainable development of agriculture sector. The four-year's water improvement project when completed would save around eight million MAF water and help to bring extra land under cultivation.
He said other steps taken by the present government included reduction of mark-up for agriculture loans which had been brought to nine per cent from 14 per cent while other concessions had been granted in the imports of agriculture machinery and DAP fertiliser.
Appreciating the recommendations of the seminar to enhance wheat production, he also mentioned the steps taken by the federal government to increase the wheat production.
He said water availability had been improved considerably this year as 31 MAF water would be available during the current cropping season compared to 26 MAF last year.
He said that around 0.216 million tons certified seeds were available which was more than 23,000 tons as compared to last year.
He said the required quantity of urea and DAP was also available while prices of weedicides had also been brought down. He said agriculture loan had been increased to Rs 130 billion compared to last year's Rs 108 billion. Banks had been directed to facilitate small and medium landholders.
He advised the growers to complete wheat sowing by 15th of November to surpass last year's production of 21.1 million tons.
He said in wheat market some positive changes had been made which included removal of all restrictions on the inter-district and inter-province movement of wheat while private sector had also been allowed to import wheat, which would improve the availability and help stabilise the price structure.
He said for 'grow more wheat' government had allocated a sum of Rs 50 million to provide guidance and transfer of modern technology of farming to growers.
He said in every village there was a progressive grower who was having a yield of 1600 kg per acre, whereas the average yield had been recorded at 1000 kg. He emphasised the need for bridging the gap in per acre yield by adopting modern methods of cultivation.
He said government had launched several programmes for the development of agriculture sector, which included Agriculture Sector Programme Loan-II which envisaged financial backup for development of agriculture sector, financing of High Value Agriculture, Livestock, Horticulture and Agribusiness projects. He said the government had been attaching special attention for development of agro-based Industries for which MoUs had already been signed with several countries including China and Thailand.
Earlier, agriculture scientists had discussed at length prospects and problems of wheat cultivation. The seminar was attended by a large number of agriculturists, research scholars, and agriculture scientists.