Azeem Ahmed Khan

Pakistan’s sugarcane production rose slightly during 2025-26, supported by a higher cultivated area despite a dip in yield and production losses in major producing regions, shows an official document available with Wealth Pakistan. It shows that the total area under sugarcane cultivation in 2025-26 reached 1.21 million hectares, showing a 1.7% increase over the previous year’s 1.19 million hectares. The country’s sugarcane production is provisionally estimated at 84.74 million tons against 84.24 million tons in 2024-25, reflecting a small increase of 0.6%.

The average yield, however, has declined by 1.1% to 69.81 tons per hectare from 70.61 tons per hectare previously. Sugarcane is a high-value cash crop of Pakistan and holds great significance for the country’s sugar-related industries, which are the second-largest agro-industry after textiles. Punjab, which contributes the largest share to national sugarcane output, expanded its area by 4.8% to 856,000 hectares during 2025-26.

With the expansion in area, Punjab’s sugarcane production has risen by 2.7% to 61.73 million tons from 60.11 million tons, though yield declined by 2.0% from 73.6 to 72.1 tons per hectare. Sindh has experienced a decline in both area and production, with cultivation area down 6.2% to 267,700 hectares and production decreasing 5.6% to 18.13 million tons from 19.21 million tons in the previous year. However, the province’s yield improved slightly by 0.6% to 67.7 tons per hectare.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa recorded a marginal decrease of 0.8% in the cultivated area to 89,300 hectares from 90,000, but its production remained steady at around 4.8 million tons. The yield stayed unchanged at 54.1 tons per hectare. Balochistan, though a small producer, showed improvement with its area rising 14.3% to 800 hectares from 700 and production increasing 6.9% to 38,900 tons from 36,400 tons in the previous year.

The document shows that the Federal Committee on Agriculture (FCA) had set a target of 1.146 million hectares for sugarcane cultivation during 2025-26. According to provisional estimates the actual area achieved was 1.213 million hectares, 5.9% higher than the target, while production at 84.74 million tons exceeded the target of 80.32 million tons by 5.5%. This depicts an increase of 0.6% from the previous year.

Punjab exceeded its targets, with the cultivated area up 12.5% and production higher by almost the same margin. Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, however, fell short of both area and production targets, recording shortfalls of 7.7% and 6.0%, respectively, in area, and 9.1% and 7.0%, respectively, in production. Balochistan exceeded its area target by 14.3%, but fell short of the production target by 13.6%.

According to the document, during 2024-25, the country’s total yield was recorded at 69.8 tons per hectare, which was 0.3% lower than the FCA target of 70.0 tons per hectare.

Credit: INP-WealthPk