LAHORE: Agriculture Secretary Iftikhar Ali Sahoo has said that the cotton crop has entered a critical phase and the next two weeks are important in terms of crop management.

The agriculture extension staff should further improve the farmer outreach programme as well as cotton pest scouting, surveillance and timely control of pest attack along with technical guidance of the growers according to the plant nutritional requirements, he said.

He was presiding over a meeting of the Dera Ghazi Khan Divisional Cotton Management Committee.

He said the revenue staff should be posted to countercheck the field activities of agriculture extension.

For the better care of cotton, the irrigation department should ensure the supply of water to the tail end of the fields for the next 15 days, he added.

The secretary was told that an area of 0.933 million acres is under cottoncultivation in Dera Ghazi Khan division and is at the productive stage. In the division, the attack of white fly and pink bollworm has been observed in some places, but it has not reached the economic threshold level, while teams of extension and pest warning are taking remedies.

He was further told that 20 per cent of the early sown cotton has been picked and so far over 85,000 bales of cotton have reached the ginning factories. There are 30 ginning factories working in Dera Ghazi Khan division.

Mr Sahoo directed the divisional director to spraypesthotspotsunder his personal supervision and prepare a complete record of the arrival and delivery of cotton in the ginning factories so that in the light of these results a better strategy can be prepared for the next crop.

He hoped that with dedicated hard work of the next two weeks and the cooperation of the district administration, the production target set for Dera Ghazi Khan division would be achieved.