LAHORE – Efforts will be made to bring more land under cotton cultivation this year for which unprecedented prices are being offered to farmers, Punjab Agriculture Secretary Arif Nadeem said on Saturday. He was chairing a meeting on cotton crop 2011 at the Central Cotton Research Institute, Multan. Nadeem said that the Punjab Agriculture Department has finalised a plan to increase cotton production this year. The secretary said that there will be a special focus on the pre-sowing and after sowing stages along with effective pest control for which the print and electronic media will be effectively used to guide cotton growers.
Nadeem said that the department had a good stock of urea fertilizers and DAP fertilizers will be made available in the market. He directed the extension and pest warning wings of the agriculture department to prepare inventory of cotton-specific pesticides for an effective planning to avoid speculators. The said that there will be no water shortage this year. Earlier, Punjab Agriculture (Extension) Director General Dr Anjum Ali told the meeting that 0.35 million maunds of tested cotton seed were available, including 45,000 maunds seed of approved varieties being marketed by the Punjab Seed Corporation.
