In the last year, the 2.7% increase in agricultural growth helped pay for the decline in GDP to 0.4pc, as in the wave of Covid-19 pandemic. For the upcoming year, the government has set a 2.8% target in growth for agriculture whereas a 21% for the overall economy. Prospects for all the major crops appear good, except for cotton which is a little lesser expected to meet up to the mark.
The government has recently been trying to promote a shift from water-intensive sugar cane to cotton cultivation in agricultural sector. Primarily due to this a greater area was dedicated to cotton cultivation in 2020, which is expected to continue in 2021 and the government is planning to see a 10-15% rise in cotton alongside maintaining the sugar cane output as well.
The wheat output in the previous year remained to be around 25 million tonnes due to the lack of coordination between the federal and provincial ministers. They are however confident that the output this year will rise to 27 million tonnes. Summer maize is what contributes the greatest to the total maize output. It exceeded 7.2 million tonnes and is expected to go a further more of 7-7.5 million tonnes in the ongoing year.
Just like other major crops, the livestock sub-sector also intends to be promising in 2021. In 2020 the growth was 2.6% compared to the previous 3.8%. It should be growing in the coming year at the targeted rate of 3.5% or a little below that if be. A lack of data on cattle heads and their productivity is what makes it difficult for the meat and milk sector companies to invest in appropriately. Here exploitation becomes more possible.
