PASSCO Procures 860,000 Metric Tons Wheat

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 22nd May, 2017 ) : Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Services Corporation (PASSCO) has so far procured about 860,000 metric tons of wheat during the current procurement campaign across the grain-producing areas of the country.

The Corporation had been assigned a task to procure about 900,000 metric tons of the wheat during crop season 2017-18 in order to fulfill the domestic requirements of the staple foods as well as to keep the strategic food reserves of the country, said an official of PASSCO.

Talking to APP on Monday, he said that about 725,500 metric tons of wheat procured from the Punjab as the government has established 205 procurement centers across the province in order to facilitate the growers to sell their produces at official fixed rates, he added.

Meanwhile, he said that during the current campaign so far about 100,200 metric tons of the commodity was procured from the Sindh province as 15 procurement centers were also established there to save the farmers from the exploitation of the middleman and providing them the proper price of their output.

About 34,500 metric tons of the wheat were procured from the Balochistan Province where 8 centers were established to procure the commodity, he added.

In order to smooth and transparent distribution of sacks, the corporation in collaboration with provincial land revenue departments had conducted field survey and removed the bogus registration of about 2.5 million acres of land.

So far, he said that 99.95 percent distribution of bardana (sacks) had been completed as the corporation had distributed about 899,579 metric tons (8.995) million of sacks among the growers across the country.

For the current procurement campaign, the government had set a target to distribute about 900,000 metric tons (9) million of sacks to facilitate the wheat growers in the country, he added. In Punjab about 716,000 metric tons of sacks (7.16) million were distributed, where as small scale growers were on the top priority of the distribution list, he added.

Meanwhile, in Sindh about 110,000 metric tons of sacks (1.10) million have been distributed and 34,000 metric tons of bags (0.320) million were provided to farmers of Balochistan, he added.