News

Sep 10, 2023

Garlic growers in troubled water

LAHORE – Large scale cultivation of high-yield NARC GI garlic variety has

LAHORE – Large scale cultivation of high-yield NARC GI garlic variety has created demand and supply issue, causing growers to face heavy economic losses.

Far less local production than the actual demand was causing Pakistan to spend billions on the import of essential kitchen item. Due to this reason, the price of garlic everywhere in Pakistan was on the higher side. Introduction of the high-yield NARC GI variety and its ready acceptance among farmers helped Pakistan save precious foreign exchange being spent on its import.

Availability of garlic in abundance has also benefitted consumers. But growers are the ultimate sufferer of this apparently good scenario for the country and the end consumers. Growers are facing it really difficult to get returns according to their initial assessment. In majority of the cases, growers are not even getting their original input cost.

Experts believe that lack of advisory by National Agricultural Research Centre (NARC), developer of high-yield garlic variety, and unrealistic desire of growers and investors to earn more money has led to this scenario.

"If this situation is not tackled properly, growers will suffer huge losses. Most of these will not be able to get returns equal to the input cost", said Aamer Hayat Bhandara, a progressive farmer from Pakpattan and co-founder of Agriculture Republic and Digital Dera.

Prior to the introduction of G1, common verities in Pakistan are ‘Lehson Gulab’, Italian, Iranian and Chinese garlic. The per acre yield of locally produced garlic is around 70 to 80 maunds while the new variety had been producing around 200 to 250 maunds per acre, much more than the expectations of farmers. The per acre revenue generation through production of the G1 is estimated around Rs10 million which can be increased by adopting technology and better farming practices. Huge earning prospects and the resultant more demand led to increase in the prices of seeds and other inputs. Not only genuine growers but also investors jumped in to get good returns. Large scale cultivation of new variety has resulted in such a huge production which cannot be handled by the local market.

"One crop gets handsome returns one year and becomes a liability in the next year is a normal routine. The same has happened with garlic this time around. The reason is lack of advisory and proper planning on the part of the government", said Aamer Hayat Bhandara while suggesting people at helm of affairs to devise short and long term plans to facilitate hapless garlic growers.

"Government should identify suitable market for the immediate export of garlic in raw farm. In the long run, there is a need of going for value addition for capturing high-end markets", he said.