Agriculture: A Rare Bright Spot in Pakistan's Economy

Pakistan's agriculture sector grew 6.3% in 2023-24, far outpacing the overall economy that grew just 2.38%, according to the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2023-24.  This is good news for about 40% of the country's population working in the agriculture sector. By contrast, India's agriculture growth slowed to 1.2% in recent quarters. Studies have shown that strong growth in agriculture helps reduce poverty in developing nations like India and Pakistan. 

Snapshot of Pakistan's Economy. Source: Economic Survey of Pakistan 2023-24

The agriculture growth in Pakistan was the highest in 19 years. All major crops saw significant increases. Wheat output jumped 11.6% from 28.2 million tons last year to 31.4 million tons this year, the economic survey said. Cotton, severely damaged by floods and rains last year, reached 10.2 million bales compared to 4.9 million bales last year, growing by 108.2%. Rice output also saw a significant increase — up by 34.8% — reaching 9.9 million tons compared to 7.3 million tons. 

Strong crop output is in part the result of higher yields from increased water and fertilizer availability to farmers, according to the economic survey. 

The survey said the water availability during Kharif 2023 increased to 61.9 million acre-feet (MAF) from 43.3 MAF in Kharif 2022 (when the floods hit). For Rabi 2023-24, the water availability was 30.6 MAF, showing an increase of 4.1% over Rabi 2022-23.

Domestic fertilizer production during FY24 (July-March) rose by 17.3% to 3.25 million tons compared to 2.77 million tons in the same period of FY23. Fertilizer imports also increased by 23.7%, reaching 524,000 ton­s. The availability of fertilizer increased by 18.1% to 3.77 million tons. 

Pakistan's Rice Exports Soared 80% in Current Fiscal Year. Source: FT

The value of Pakistan’s rice exports soared to $3.6 billion over the last 11 months, up from $2 billion in July to May 2022-23. Its previous record for was 4.8 million metric tons of rice exports, valued at about $2.5 billion in 2021-22, according to the Financial Times. 

Pakistan is among the world's largest food producing countries. It produces large and growing quantities of cereals, meat, milk, fruits and vegetables. Currently, Pakistan produces about 38 million tons of cereals (mainly wheat, rice and corn), 17 million tons of fruits and vegetables, 70 million tons of sugarcane, 60 million tons of milk and 4.5 million tons of meat.  Total value of the nation's agricultural output exceeds $70 billion.  Improving agriculture inputs and modernizing value chains can help the farm sector become much more productive to serve both domestic and export markets.  

Agriculture is considered a key tool for reducing poverty in developing countries like Pakistan. It employs almost half of the rural workforce, contributes around 20% to the country's GDP, and provides raw materials for agro-based industries, according to a study by Yaping Liu, Asad Amin, Samma Faiz Rasool, and Qamar Uz Zaman.  However, some studies suggest that agriculture may only help mitigate rural poverty in the long term, while other sources say that sustainable agriculture practices can significantly improve agricultural production and reduce poverty.

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Chicken Cheaper Than Daal

Meat Industry in Pakistan

Bumper Crops and Soaring Tractor Sales in Pakistan

Meat and Dairy Revolution in Pakistan

Pakistanis Consuming More Calories, Fruits and Vegetables

Eid ul Azha: Multi-Billion Dollar Urban-to-Rural Transfer

Pakistan's Rural Economy

Pakistan Among World's Largest Food Producing Countries

Pakistan Sets New Record For Rice Exports

Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel

PakAlumni Social Network

US Blames Pak Fertilizer For IEDs in Afghanistan

It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy, but to be America’s friend is fatal.” Henry Kissinger 1968

What Dr. Kissinger said about South Vietnam in 1968 is just as relevant today for US allies Mexico and Pakistan. Both nations are paying with their blood every day for being US allies.

In yet another blow to the already fragile US-Pakistan ties, the US Congress has frozen $700 million in aid to Pakistan until it gives assurances it is helping fight the spread of improvised bombs, or IEDs, in the region by regulating the distribution of calcium ammonium nitrate fertilizer. While the loss of a few hundred American lives to IEDs each year in a war zone needs to be reduced, the hypocrisy US legislators is evident by its failure to legislate to control guns in America that claim 30,000 lives (including suicides) each year in the United States, and tens of thousands more in drug related gun violence in Mexico.

The most recent figure released by the Mexican government on the number of dead during the last 4 years is just over 34,000, according to Los Angeles Times. It's the consumption of drugs in the United States that makes drug smuggling highly profitable for powerful drug cartels, and it's the US made guns smuggled across the border into Mexico that account for the bulk of the Mexican fatalities.



US Military commanders say fertilizer bomb in Afghanistan could be as crucial to the Taliban as the surface-to-air missile was to the Afghan mujahedeen fighters in their war in the 1980s against the Soviets, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

In response to US concerns, Afghanistan government banned the use of Ammonium Nitrate last year. Pakistan followed suit by banning its use in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province which borders Afghanistan. The ban has been effective in significantly cutting IED casualties in 2011. There have been 192 IED related deaths till Sept this year, down from 368 last year, according to report in Time magazine. Part of the decline is attributed to the fact that the Taliban are now detonating roadside bombs with electronic signals, serving two purposes: they let the triggerman allow civilian vehicles to pass safely, and also let him time the explosion so the increasingly-sophisticated shaped-charged IEDs would do the most damage to the target vehicle.

As a land-locked and food deficit nation, Afghanistan gets the bulk of what it needs to survive from or through Pakistan across the 1500 mile long border shared by the two nations. Stricter controls on smuggling of Ammonium Nitrate may help reduce it but it's unrealistic to expect to completely eliminate it. Similar fertilizer is used by other Afghan neighbors and it is probably already being smuggled by determined insurgents into the country.

While the number of IED related deaths in Iraq number in hundreds, there are 30,000 lives lost annually to gun violence in the United States, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 100,000 Americans are victims of gun violence each year. In addition to those who are killed or injured, there are countless others whose lives are forever changed by the deaths of and injuries to their loved ones.



There are obvious parallels between the the US-Mexican border and the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in terms of cross border smuggling and violence. The key difference is that the number of casualties in Afghanistan is only a small fraction of the death toll in Mexico and Pakistan. Given the Congressional inaction on gun control in the United States, the demands made on Pakistan are just hypocritical. Such demands and threat of punitive action against Pakistan will only worsen the US-Pakistan relations and damage the US efforts in the region.

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

Afghanistan and Pakistan Facts & Myths

US Military Undermining Interests in "AfPak"

Is US-Pakistan Military Confrontation Inevitable?

Seeing Bin Laden's Death in Wider Perspective

Who Are the Haqqanis?

Military Mutiny in Pakistan?

Can US Aid Remake Pakistan?