The cotton crop is under pest and ‘sucking complex’ attack again this year in lower Sindh as crop has entered picking stage. Picking will be in full swing by September. But pest attacks on Bt cotton — a genetically modified variety, which produces an insecticide to bollworm — have become a regular phenomenon, due mainly to poor quality of seed, climate change, procurement price and degeneration.
In Sindh, Bt cotton has been sown since 2010 as weather is suitable for this variety, especially in the coastal belt of province’s lower region. This is why Sindh is still coming up with more per-acre yields than Punjab despite factors affecting cotton crop, says Dr Khalid Abdullah, the federal cotton commissioner.
Sindh achieved yields of more than 1,000 kilograms per hectare between 2011 and 2014 as compared to Punjab’s 700kg to 750kg during the period, he said, quoting figures of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics. In 2011-12, per-hectare yield in Sindh touched 1,546kg, more than double as compared to Punjab’s.Read More
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