Report: Murtaza Zaib Zehri
Allah Bakhsh Baloch, a farmer of Balochistan’s Kech district, says that the 2022 floods have robbed him of his livelihood, resulting in a loss of millions of rupees.
Allah Bakhsh, who cultivates date palm, said that the ready crops in his fields were exposed to floods, destroying all the fruits of his labour.
“Our livelihood depended on this crop, but one night’s rain washed away everything. Now we are facing financial difficulties, and we are bearing the brunt of the loss,” he said.
The flood has also adversely affected other landowners in the area, who are now scrambling to revive their businesses. Allah Bakhsh added that the local government and non-governmental organizations should take immediate steps to help the victims.
Relief activities have been initiated by the government, but many victims are still waiting for financial assistance. Allah Bakhsh says that if immediate help is not provided, many families may suffer.
This situation reflects the profound impact of natural disasters on agriculture, and the need for a long-term strategy to address the issue.
In Ketch and Panjgur districts of Makran division, most of the farmers depend on date crop, but the monsoon rains have taken away this source of livelihood from them.
Haji Molabakhsh said that 90% of the date plantations were destroyed in the flood, due to which the farmers lost millions of rupees, 10 to 15% of the crops were left and even the basic expenses could not be met due to this.
In Balochistan, 75% of the people’s source of livelihood is related to agriculture and land sector, but due to recent climate changes, after untimely heavy rains, flood situation has arisen in many areas due to which farmers and laborers related to agriculture sector are facing financial difficulties.
According to the statistics of Agriculture department, 15 thousand 885 farmers are registered in the district, who are farming in Balida, Turbat, Hoshab, Mandu and other areas. Farmers of Ketch district
Dependence is on the date crop, which is well known for its taste and high quality.
According to statistics, the annual production of dates in Kech is around 150,000 tons. Due to the monsoon rains last year, like other crops, date plantations have also been affected, due to which the farmers have to face heavy financial losses.
The yield of date palm in Ketch is 6,590 kg per acre, which was lost to monsoon rains last year.
According to the sources of the Agriculture Department, there are 24,827 hectares of date plantations in Kech district, however, during the stormy rains in 2022, 18,885 hectares of date crops were destroyed due to floods. The estimated loss is 4 thousand 400 million.
According to the statistics of the Department of Agriculture, there are 105 types of dates in Kech district, which are unique in terms of taste and quality. These dates are cultivated in different areas.
According to statistics, the demand for “Begum Jangi” dates is high, which is the first and this type of dates is cultivated on 10,800 hectares and there are 18,57,600 trees in total, while the annual production of Begum Jangi is 65,16 tons and each tree produces an average of 35 kilograms of dates.
On the second place are “Husseini” date palms spread over 1,645 hectares, their annual production is 9,993 tons and the number of trees is 2,82,840.
Similarly, Halini 8 thousand 428 and Gok Nah (date varieties) are third and fourth respectively with 7 thousand 775 tons and the yield of both these types of dates is 40 kg per tree.
In the country, most of the date palms are cultivated in the two districts of Makran, Kech and Panjgur. According to a report of 2005-2006, date plantations in Balochistan are 48,136 hectares and the annual production is 252,317 tons, in Sindh, 26,681 and 192,810 tons in Punjab. in 5797 hectares and 42580 tonnes and in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, date plantations are spread over 1377 hectares and the annual production is 8869 tonnes.
The owner of a local date processing company and a well-known businessman, Muqbal Alam Noori, says that due to lack of cold storage, farmers in both districts sell dates at exorbitant prices.
In earlier times, a date processing cold storage was constructed in Kech, which has the capacity to store 1,000 tonnes of date palm while Makran Bhar produces 250 to 300,000 tonnes of date palm annually. According to Maqbool Alam Noori, before this storage, the merchants of Sukkur and Khairpur used to buy between 800 and 900 per manna of dates from local farmers.
Now local farmers are selling 2500 to 3000 dates per maund. He said that by building a date processing unit in Makran at the government and non-government level, not only Makran dates can be brought to global markets, but local landowners can get millions of rupees of extra profit every year.
According to them, Makran’s dates are more durable than neighboring Iran’s dates in terms of quality.
