|
Main Page
|
 |
|
News Channel |
|
Agri, industrial growth to surpass expectations
KARACHI, March 31: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP)
said here Tuesday the overall agriculture sector
remained positive during the first half of the
current fiscal year despite the decline in the
cotton crop and the impact of the bird flu crisis.
In its second quarterly report, the central bank
said improvement in agriculture production was
mainly due to more efforts by the farmers to
improve productivity by capitalising on good agri-product
prices, improved water availability and more
efficient credit disbursement by banks.
The report lauded the performance of commercial
banks for higher disbursement of loans for the
agriculture sector, which was Rs 32.8 billion in
the first half of current fiscal year and it is
expected that credits disbursement to the agri-sector
will surpass the target of Rs 65.6 billion by the
end of fiscal year 2004. It said the recovery of
agriculture loans registered an across-the-board
improvement during the first half of the current
fiscal, which was 24.4 percent higher than the
recovery made during the corresponding period in
the preceding fiscal year.
The central bank said another major reason for the
higher agriculture produce is availability of
water during most of the Kharif and Rabi crops due
to better rainfalls and added good monsoon rains
helped avert the near drought situation and the
water availability further improved through timely
winter rains.
The aggregate availability of 91.0 million acre
feet (MAF) during the crop year of current fiscal
year was 11.0 percent higher than in the
corresponding period the preceding year.
But the report said aggregate canal head water
availability remained in deficit at only 88.0
percent of that in normal years, while the water
shortage in Rabi was about 31.1 percent of normal
despite the fact that all the water reservoir were
filled with capacity.
Major crops: The central bank said important crops
that contribute to about 90.0 percent share in
major crops which includes cotton, rice, sugarcane
and wheat, and highlights that total area of
cultivation of increased 3.6 percent during the
fiscal year 2004.
While the highest increase was recorded in the
rice crops, the area of cultivation for sugarcane
declined due to number of reasons including low
pries. Unlike the cotton, rice and wheat crops the
prices of sugarcane settled at the previous year’s
level.
Similarly the total fertiliser off-take during the
Rabi season of current fiscal year increased 10.6
percent to 3.1 million tonnes from 2.9 million
tonnes in the preceding fiscal year.
Industrial production: The report said industrial
production strongly surged during the first half
of current fiscal year with an increase of 12.6
percent compared to growth of 5.1 per cent
recorded in the same period last fiscal year.
This performance was dominated by the very strong
growth by both, large scale manufacturing (LSM)
and electricity generation. Industrial growth was
witnessed in most month of the first half of the
current fiscal but it registered a decline of 1.1
percent in November 2003 due to various factors
including delay in sugarcane crushing season,
temporary supply glut that led to slow down in POL
refining operation due to Ramzan followed by the
Eid holidays.
Demand for furnace oil also declined due to
substation of thermal with hydel power and greater
availability of gas. While the export of furnace
oil from Pakistan has not yet started.
The report said that a further analysis shows that
the overall large scale manufacturing growth
during first half of current fiscal year remained
well above 10 percent even if high performers such
as sugar, automobile and electronics are excluded
from the calculations.
Consumer financing: Consu-mer financing for auto
mortgage, housing finance and personal loans,
higher farm income and lower interest rates have
largely contributed in raising domestic
consumption.
The impact of higher domestic consumption was
particularly visible in the production of consumer
durables, cement and other related industries such
as paints, glass, basic metals, industrial
chemicals, tyres and tubes, packaging material.
The production of textile also kept pace with the
growth in most other LSM sub-sector despite higher
cotton prices, besides there has been a remarkable
growth of 17.8 percent in pharmaceutical products
during the first half of current fiscal, compared
to decline of 0.5 percent in the same period last
fiscal year.
Daily Times |
|
|
|
|
Pakissan.com; Advisory Point
|
|
